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Chapter Text

To be Prince of Madness was not just to embrace change, it was to be it. To live an everlasting existence of paradoxes, inhabiting a world of uncertainty where the only certainty was that in the Shivering Isles, Sheogorath ruled.

Identities were passing shadows. Oh, he was fond of some more than others - the Old Man was one that felt correct if not right - but to be a Daedric Prince encompassed so much more than the material. It encompassed more than memory, and in his moments of melancholy a part of him tasted bitterness to understand how many parts of him were scattered to the wind. An unravelling shawl, endless loose threads that just would not stop, and soon enough his melancholy turned to anger and its cause was forgotten.

So it was for centuries, until dragons returned to Tamriel - and with them, the Dragonborn.

For the first time Sheogorath could remember all the endless noise and costumes came to a standstill. Standing on Tamriel once more, under the shadow of dragon wings, one of the loose threads of his mind was pulled tight and plucked.

A vibration, a hum, like a bowstring on vocal cords. Something was important. Something was terribly important.

For the first time ever Sheogorath felt fear.

He paced the realm, trying to discover the why of it - the very word instilling nausea, like he’d eaten rotted cheese. A stink on his breath, why, why - why had never mattered before, but now he tried to figure it out in the ways only he knew how.

Perhaps Hermaeus Mora knew, but that was an option best left until he was driven to the point of sanity - or whatever lay further than Sheogorath’s domain, the concept of such distracting him long enough that he forgot what he was searching for again.

Until he was called.

A voice - a Voice, humming and strong as the note under dragon wings, seeking him, beseeching him.

Him?

Amidst the butterflies it didn’t feel right. Nothing was ever right as Sheogorath, it was in the nature of being Prince - but called by the Voice, a different mantle than ever before felt necessary. He sorted through his wardrobe, pulled out costume on costume, and none fit - he’d gone past the bodies, now, until at last something threadworn and dusty caught his eye. It stank of tears.

Not him. Her.

Sheogorath manifested herself in the courtyard of Sky Haven Temple, a mirror to the Dragonborn in front of her. It all felt familiar - the stone and sloped roofs, the woman before her watery-eyed and exhausted - but before she could get caught up in it all the Dragonborn began to talk, and all was a mess of fabric once more.

It was only aiding a pilgrim again, something done time and time over - stress had pushed the Dragonborn to what Sheogorath so lovingly termed self discovery, and all that was left was to step inside her mind and see just what could be done to solve the battle between the interior and exterior.

The Prince did not expect a host of dragon souls - nor a great golden drake in the sky of the mindscape, easily mistaken for a trick of the light, sun on cloud’s edge.

Yet she had seen it before. Sheogorath was certain. The vibration returned, a quiver in the chest, physical sensation. She was touched, something impossible - and with touch came pain.

The Dragonborn was the answer. Even when her grievances with the dragon souls were dealt with, Sheogorath followed her. In every butterfly landing on a wildflower Sheogorath followed, in every old woman, every cloaked figure.

In an eternity of uncertainty, the Prince of Madness had found another certainty. Around the Dragonborn, things that were forgotten returned.

For once there was no need for action, for change - the Dragonborn was left to her own devices, as if meddling would ruin it all. Even when she was near death Sheogorath did nothing, for perhaps there would be truth in her blood or bones. Death never came to the Dragonborn.

Not in the usual way.

The girl found the veil between worlds, and was kissed goodbye before she stepped between it. Sheogorath followed, for the sight of the girl’s last tearful embrace was achingly familiar.

In Sovngarde must have lain truth.

It was not Oblivion, nor Mundus, a realm that tore at Sheogorath like a bitter wind, flaying her skin bare. Now she could not leave, and perhaps it was all a terrible trap, some ploy by the other Princes, a way to get rid of her at last.

All paranoia was ripped away when the great drake spread its wings, and the Dragonborn shouted and sang. The fabric was tearing, each blow exchanged cracked the mirror, and Sheogorath could do naught but watch. In the great drake was a shadow of a shadow, a glimmer of what once was, and with every blow of the hammer the Dragonborn was letting more of the light shine through.

At last the beast fell, scales turning to powder - no, to sand - and the realm grew still enough for Sheogorath to return to physical form. The dragon’s skull remained, its mouth stretched open wide enough for any to walk through. A mouth was a door, that the Prince knew well. Somewhere in her mind she knew that it was a door she had been searching for, the door, hidden for centuries.

All that was left was to enter it.

She walked past the Dragonborn, weeping and bleeding and clutching onto her warhammer as if it could root her in place even as Sovngarde was falling away at her feet. As Sheogorath was footsteps away there was a shift in the aurora above, and a figure of light manifested within the skull of the father of dragons, hand outstretched.

No, not the father. Sheogorath thought, another truth returned from the fog as she took the figure’s hand.

In the blink of an eye, the world had changed. Sovngarde was gone - as was the figure - and in its place was an endless desert with golden sands.

The sky above was a deep navy and starless, though the sands seemed to light themselves. Settled within the dunes were dragon bones, earthed and unearthed, the dunes flowing like sea waves back and forth over the ivory.

Sheogorath could feel the grains of sand pass over her skin, the wind tug at her hair. Tears stung her eyes, and she batted them away with warm hands.

When was the last time her hands had been warm?

The vibration, the humming, the note, the voice - it was growing to a crescendo, a pounding drum beat - no, that was her feet hitting the ground. Somewhere she had begun running, somewhere her feet had become bare, somewhere she was dressed in a prisoner’s rags again.

The music chased her through the endless dunes until at last exhaustion took her, a feeling no Prince would ever suffer, and as she stumbled to a halt with burning lungs the music consumed her.

The drumbeat was her heart, the humming blood running through her veins, the vibration…

A sigil stone in her hands, Oblivion ripping itself apart around her.

The note -

A cry from her throat, cracking with grief.

The voice -

“Vaka.”

Sheogorath looked sharply upward, and saw the figure of light again. A man, in humble robes, a silhouette - a blindingly bright dragon with wings outstretched behind him, making it impossible to see his face.

Vaka.

Prisoner. Hero of Kvatch. Champion of Cyrodiil. Mother. Prince of Madness.

How many mantles had she worn?

An eternity returned to her. Walking into Oblivion in a mortal’s body, over and over, only done in knowledge of seeing him again. A kiss goodbye, a dragon bright as the sun, a scream in her throat that would not stop. A world that was no longer home, a call to the beyond, a babe in her belly, a Daedric Prince draped around her shoulders like a cloak. She had entered the Shivering Isles as she had entered Oblivion before, in the knowledge she would see him again.

However long it took.

Centuries passed her by like the dunes shifting around her, and she’d forgotten, her power bought at a steep cost, yet now…

Now the light of the dragon faded, and before her stood a man with blue eyes and a face achingly familiar to that of the gatekeeper of the Fringe.

The gatekeeper. Her son. Their son. Then...

“Martin.” she whispered, and then she was running - she could not close the distance fast enough, for after centuries even a few seconds were unbearable.

Cloth and the scent of the past enveloped her, the soft blow of his body connecting with hers as he ran to meet her a final drumbeat. Change and time intertwined, solid and real. Through death and divinity she had traveled, all in the faintest dream that she could undo the pain that had been wrought.

It wasn’t a dream, it wasn’t a momentary memory - his lips were vivid on hers, body warm, hands touching every part of her he could as she did the same to him. In the spaces between eternity, they whispered.

“I swore I’d find you.” she said. “As I did in Kvatch. Nothing could keep you from me. I… I had forgotten, I forgot you -”

“No.” he murmured against her cheek. “You never did. You remembered once, so you always would. Time isn’t the line you think it is.”

At once their surroundings didn’t seem so surreal, the abyss of years between them vanished in a heartbeat - and Vaka smiled down at him. “That sounds mad.”

Martin returned her smile, taking her hand in his and pressing it to his lips. “We always were.” he chuckled, as if they were in Cloud Ruler Temple again, exchanging jokes amidst the exhaustion. “Now…” Hand still holding hers, he walked backwards, leading her along with him as the dunes fell away beneath them. They were on the Orange Road to Bruma once more, the summer sun golden over the Jerall Mountains and the Imperial City shining to the south. “... what do you say to making up for lost time?”

“You’ve planned this.” she breathed.

“I knew you’d come,” he answered. “A time in Tamriel, and then, I think, some time in the Isles.” Martin’s tone held no melancholy, expression soft. “For I’d like to meet our son, after so long watching him.”

It was all too good, too warm, too beautiful - with her identity returned and mortality upon her once again she knew too well how life was blade between her ribs, and as a Prince she had known it an immutable part of being mortal. “How long can you stay?”

To her surprise, he laughed. The leaves of the canopy above turned gold in the sun. “For a few certain days of the year, but I’ve had an age upon an age to learn how they can fold upon one another.” Martin rested his hand on the side of her face, his blue eyes she knew so well scattered with gold like grains of sand. “For as long as we’ve dreamed. As long as we deserved.”

He pulled her down into another kiss.

--

Alduin fell at night, and his fall begat the most vivid aurora Skyrim had ever seen - gold and blue light interweaving across the sky. They returned on each anniversary of the event, and folk legend came to call them Akatosh’s Tears.

The Dragonborn, however, called them Akatosh’s Tapestry, the lone soul to witness Daedric and Divine become one.

Chapter Text

At the Fringe of the Shivering Isles, a Gatekeeper stood watch. A man, unlike his predecessors, but no less vigilant - no less protective.

His eyes reflected the split world around him in reflection and color - one blue, one green - an inheritance from mortals come Gods.

He had lived a mortal’s life, as they did - marked with tragedy, as theirs was. The son of a Mad God, turned so by the loss of her love. Raised by her in her saner moments and Haskill when she was lost, departing when he became a man for the mortal world of Tamriel, for his mother’s homeland: The Reach. Guided by visions granted to him by his father’s blood; he had founded a clan of outcasts, loved, sired children, and grew to be old. When he died, he returned to the place of his birth as a young man - to shepherd in outcasts once more for eternity.

A shift in the air - a sweet, familiar breeze - whispered of the moment foretold in his dreams. At last.

Those who had given him his eyes were going to find him.

The heroes who’d mantled Akatosh and Sheogorath had reunited at last, and would soon seek out their son.

Light, then - he lifted one hand from his staff and shielded his eyes, as the night sky above shifted color to a vibrant gold.

His mother stood before the Gate, a man beside her. Priest's robes adorned him, and dragon wings of sunlight shimmered at his back. His face - familiar, seen in mirrors and still waters.

“Stellan,” The Hero of Kvatch come Sheogorath sobbed - recognition on her face for the first time in centuries. She nearly stumbled in her rush to reach him, engulfing him in a tight embrace.

The Gatekeeper - Stellan Septim - smiled into his mother’s shoulder. It was this moment that had lifted his spirits through the centuries, gifted to him in dreams - a promise that one day all would be right.

"I thought I had dreamed you," she murmured against him. "I thought I had made you up." She pulled back, searching his face. "How could I?"

"You had so many other things to remember - and to forget," Stellan reassured gently. "I have always known the truth of it. Of you. I have always known this day would come. It has made my burden light." He lifted his gaze to the man with dragon wings and a face so like his own. "It was you. Father."

Martin Septim inclined his head - until then, quietly watching with a bittersweet expression. “The only gift I could grant you,” he said softly. Then, with a slight smile, “you’re taller than I expected. You must take after your mother.”

A thoughtful pause from his son. “I’ve had nothing to expect. I’ve only seen the weight of your legacy - I suppose that’s what all fathers are, who’ve not lived to meet their children.”

The man turned Divine took a few steps forward, then stopped. His face twisted with pain, looking between the woman he loved and their son, confronted with a wound that had lasted centuries.

At this, Stellan released his mother and met Martin halfway, not hesitating to pull his father into a tight embrace. “Thank you,” he mumbled. “For all you’ve done.”

“Would that you could have been an Emperor’s son,” Martin whispered, voice cracking with emotion. “You would have been magnificent.” He pulled back to look at his son properly - at all the ways they resembled each other, at all the ways his mother shone through. Immortal proof of a brief and beautiful mortal love. “You still are.”

“I’m no flesh atronach,” Stellan laughed, “as the people here are keen to remind me.”

A sniffle from behind caught their attention. Sheogorath stood crying, desperately trying to conceal it.

“Vaka,” Martin breathed - and in a few strides both her beloved and her son were at her side. She had the mourning of centuries to feel, the merciful veil of madness lifted from her. This time, however, she need not mourn alone.

The three of them stood - father, mother, and son - a family torn apart by fate, and reunited by sacrifice. All was as it should always have been.

“Come, mother - let’s surprise Haskill,” Stellan grinned, breaking the silence. His mother swallowed her tears, and returned his smile.

“I expect this will be the maddest thing he’s seen.”