"Talion," Serana whispered, she could see and smell the life draining from her, we didn't have any potions and my restoration wasn't strong enough, "if we're going to act..."

She left it at that and I finished it in my head, we've got to act fast. I looked again at my wife, Hermaeus Mora wants to break me. Reality shimmered and gave way to my conjured blade.

"Elisif," I glared at Serana and she took tentative steps back, I redirected my focus and removed my headgear, "my wife. I'm can't lie to you," I couldn't look her in the eye, "you feel the weakness in your bones. There's only one thing I can truly guarantee you," I looked up at her my voice skyforged steel, "I will do everything in my power to keep our family together. Everything."

She groaned in effort from just nodding to me. Then it started.

I cut her connections to the vines, hacked at the veins going into her intestines and ripped her from the web of green that was attached to her back like a pad of thousands of needles. She screamed and set her down, dispelled my sword, and ice swirled in my hands before I coated her in ice. So much blood, so quickly...

I ran with her body, Serana flanked me like a wraith. The adrenaline, internal pain and my will boosted my stamina. Everything! I slid to a stop trying to remember the way. While glancing down a side hall a saw a shadow move back behind a corner. I knew it.

Frantically remembering the way I sprinted the opposite direction of the shadow. Elisif shivered and shook my arms in an agonizing mixture of cold and pain to such a degree red foam escaped her lips in a seizure. Tears streamed down my face, I felt as if the sky was falling. The eyes of my lover rolled into the back of her head and I screamed her name, as if it was going to give my bones strength. Everything. The masses of books, turning pages, expanding hallways all passed in a blur as I ran.

I crossed a bridge to the exit-book on a pedestal atop an arcing building. I opened it and kissed my wife on the lips and her touch left in a flash of green light. I ordered, "Neloth, take care of her."

No response, hmmm.

"Talion!" Serana yelled after me huffing. "Apocrypha's residents know we're here!"

"Hermaeus Mora planned this Serana. My wife was bait, bait of which I could not refuse."

"Well now that you sprung the trap," she wheezed, leaning on her axe for support, "what do we do?"

"I'm going to hold onto you and you're going to trust me."

The seekers, lurkers and corrupted Dremora Lords got onto the bridge and advanced towards us. Serana glanced at the host coming upon us. She said incredulously, "What?!"

A ball of lurker spit flew past me and I said, "Just trust me." Serana wrapped her arms around me awkwardly and I added, "Tuck your head in and hold on tighter."

She obeyed but tried to complain before my shout shot us forward:

"Wuld-Nah-Kest!"

Shooting past our enemies we were across the bridge and I casually flicked a flower which controlled a door that effectively locked the two dozen opponents away from us. They came to the door and let out all manners of ululations of rage. Serana brushed herself off, "Well, I didn't expect that. Why didn't you do that earlier?"

"The reason why I told you to tuck your head in was because if your head was pulled back in the whiplash you'd be dying from a broken neck. My wife was much too weak for me to be pulling stunts like that."

I started walking and I stumbled in my step once my adrenaline faded and leaned heavily into the wall. Passing a table I noticed some scrolls and potions. They were nothing major but as I stuffed them into my bag Serana patted my shoulder.

"You were fast."

"Yeah," I mumbled, casting a fast-heal spell, regaining my energy and I handed her a green potion, "this should help. We need to move before the small army back there finds a way to us."

I also gave her some healing scrolls, should she need them. Although Serana can only heal from draining life, drinking blood, and potions, scrolls once used will be half or three-quarters as effective on her. I strode down halls into a new area of Apocrypha, going towards the greenish-yellow light that pierced the middle of the fortress above.

Once there I cast a questioning glance at my friend and she shrugged. I took out a few septims and tossed them into the light and they floated up harmlessly. Shrugging, I stepped into the light and went up into the air. Watching the ascension above me, I panicked when the path began to close and I was unceremoniously spat into a pitch black chamber. Serana was close behind me and said once next to me getting up, "Well, this is worse than any cave in Skyrim."

"Wo meyz wa dii bormahhe qahwahlaan?"*

Crap, I thought and I replied in Dovaghzul, "Dinok."

"Zu'u los fron do deyra, ahrk fron do dovahhe. Zu'u nis dir het, mey."

A cold feeling passed over me. "Wo los hi? Faal lein naak?"

"Zu'u los faal lein naak zeymah. Kul do deyrah ahrk Bormahu."

My mouth dropped and fire rolled in a dragon's mouth, briefly illuminating where it was. There was a watery laugh, "Will you humour me? Dovakiin in tinvaak? In speech?"

I am absolutely confused.

"Um, sure, Yol!" A fireball struck the Dov and it laughed like it tickled.

"That might be the first and only time I had that done! Now tell me, why are you here mortal?"

"We..." Serana said confused, "come to find crippling dark secrets of Hermaeus Mora, said to be located in the Black Scroll."

The Dov let out a series of chuckles and it caused goosebumps to run down my spine. It was as if it knew something that we don't.

"My name is Altraius Morax, the illegitimate son of Hermaeus Mora and Akatosh. Second-born, of Akatosh. I am one of those secrets."

I cast a candlelight spell and the Dov's white scales shone in the light, he had horns much like Alduin but Altraius' were straighter like the horns of a spike-horned deer. That and on the end of each scale was a hint of green.

"So wait, how were you born-?" My companion asked and the dragon laughed again.

"It's... complicated."

"So you've never held tinvaak, conversations with any Dov?" I asked.

"No, but the dragon tongue is normally natural for Dov. I felt your presence and took the opportunity to use it for the first time. Though, as you can clearly tell, I prefer the tongue of Nirn, as it is what most the texts I read are written in."

I'm not even to ask how the son of the 'Book Demon' Hermaeus Mora learned how to read.

"Are you... being forced to stay here?"

I don't know why the thing's smile in the shadows made my hairs stand as he answered vaguely, "Somewhat." It added, "But aren't you going to ask me to help you find faal Vid Kel, The Black Elder Scroll?"

Serana and I shared discreet glances with one another.

"How can we trust you?" Serana asked.

"Besides the fact that I haven't attacked you yet? You have no choice, only I can open the Lift of Secrets, take you to the Vid Kel, and help in the fight against my father who has... somewhat kept me here for eternities."

"Do you know the way?"

"Of course, when Hermaeus Mora found the Kel Akatosh desired to read it. You know all too well, champion, that knowledge is never free from my father, so guess what Akatosh made with the power of the Kel?"

"You...?"

"Correct."

"So Akatosh read it twice?"

"Once, Akatosh desired prophetic knowledge from the Kel and-" he stopped like he said to much, "how about we head to the Kel? The Elder Scroll. Maybe it will give you my more personal knowledge, as well as what you seek?"

Translation:

"Who comes to my father('s) fortress?"

"Death."

"I am kin of Daedra, and kin of dragons. I cannot die here, fool."

"Who are you? The World Eater?"

"I am the World Eater('s) brother. Son of Daedra and Akatosh."

A/N: No Altraius Morax isn't a traditional Dov name and if you haven't noticed he's not a traditional Dov. There's some unsaid reasons for this that may appear later either in the following chapters or the next book.