We're at the Winking Skeever, trying to get the chill out of our bones.

  I wish I was just talking about the weather.

  So, we got up earlier than we usually do so we could have a nice hot breakfast before trudging back up the mountain. It was bitterly cold, and a heavy snow started to fall as we made our way up a path we hadn't tried before.

  We ran into an "old" Orc at the top of the hill, surrounded by dead sabercats.

  He said that he was old, and that Malacath had given him a vision of a glorious death, so long as he waits right there. He wanted to know if I could give him one.

  Yes, he was asking me to kill him. I tried to convince him that he wasn't that old (seriously, he didn't look old at all) and had no reason to die. He was still clearly a strong fighter, and could do a lot more if he wanted to. He explained that Orc men don't like to stick around too far past their prime, for fear of becoming "useless."

  He then told us to leave unless we were there to give him the death he wanted.

  I wished him luck, and started to walk away when Erandur stopped me, then asked the others to huddle in for a talk.

  He begged me to reconsider!

  I was shocked that a priest of Mara would ask me to kill someone, but he explained that leaving the Orc here to wait for his death isn't an act of kindness or love at all. It's cruelty. This is his last wish. I granted one to Nurelion; why not him?

  I cussed in as many languages as I could, but he was right. There was a problem, though - I'm me, and the Orc was a huge warrior twice my size who clearly had no problem taking out multiple sabercats all at once!

  Valdimar argued that maybe the Orc's god was right. He was to wait there, and who should show up but the Dragonborn? Being slain by the Dragonborn would surely be a noble death, right?

  I know having some great "Destiny" sounds fun and exciting, but in reality it's short for "Work You Never Asked For And Can't Get Out Of Because The Divines Said So."

  Lydia sighed and said that she'd step in if I needed her to.

  So, I went back and challenged the Orc to a fight.

  He gave me a once over, saw the mage robes, almost complete lack of armor (I have boots), and that I was more than a head shorter than him, and asked if I was sure about that?

  I told him to prepare to die in as fierce a voice I could muster (I know it's not very intimidating. I heard Valdimar and Lydia wheezing, then Erandur try to shush them while also holding back a laugh.) and then we fought. I made sure to use a Shout on him so he and his god would know who he was fighting!

  Lydia did have to jump in, but honestly I think that made it better for him, if you think about it. The Dragonborn challenged him, and she needed backup! That should sound good in the afterlife, right?

  Erandur did a bit of Healing for me, then he and Valdimar set the body aside as respectfully as they could. He said a prayer thanking Mara for the opportunity to share Her Warmth and Benevolence in a such a cold place.

  Lydia whispered she always thought all priests were a bit strange in the head, but he was the strangest.

  She doesn't know the half of it.

  The funny thing is, that felt Real to me. Thinking back to when we met him in Dawnstar, when he was trying his best to calm the townsfolk and everything, it felt a bit… I don't know, kind of like a show? I mean, his care and everything IS real, but how he was doing it felt "off" to me. I could tell he was lying right from the start.

  I think I picked up that some of it was fake, like his accent. Went about as well as the time the little theatre troupe that likes to set up in Tiber Square hired a swordsman to play a swordsman. It sounded like a good idea at the time, but in the end it was awful because the swordsman was a swordsman, and not an actor.

  Seeing Erandur standing by the dead Orc, in all that wind and ice, saying a prayer while Valdimar stood quietly next to him with his helmet in his hand… That was Real. He was the only warm thing there, like back in Shroud Hearth Barrow.

  We were back on the road after that, looking for the bandit's hideout.

  It wasn't far, actually, and we found out that Falk Firebeard and the people of Dragon Bridge were wrong about the place. Wolfskull Cave was NOT full of bandits. It was full of Necromancers and the undead!

  Also an ancient evil, but I'll get to that.

  Out first hints were the skeletons guarding the place. I actually checked the map again, just to be sure. There's a lot of caves up here, but it looked like where the steward marked, so in we went.

  It was fairly standard as far as caves go as we went down. It looked like some mining had been going on at some point, and there were a lot of empty wine bottles around. We mostly fought draugr as we went, along with some more skeletons, but soon we ran into a necromancer. Shortly after that we came to a small but high chamber, and a handful more burst out from behind a doorway set into the stone wall, along with their undead minions.

  We took care of them, though it was a hard fight. My exploding fire familiar came in handy!

  We took a moment to heal up and have some food before continuing through the doorway. Erandur said he could feel an Evil here, and the others nodded. Maybe I felt it, too, but it might have been just because the place was a little creepy.

  It got a lot creepier after we went through the door.

  We could hear chanting, and a whooshing sound like a strong wind as we went further down. It sort of reminded me of the sound I hear when I learn a word from a Dragon Wall. Before long, the passageway opened up to reveal a massive cavern! There was a huge keep with a big tower built right in the center of it!

  Shreds of white -blue light were coming out from cracks in the cave walls, in a series of streams. They came together on top of the tower, and were semi-formed into a glowing feminine figure that floated above the building. It was quite pretty, actually, and I said as much.

  Lydia smacked the back of my head, and Valdimar tried to suppress a laugh. Erandur sighed heavily, and I know he had his face in his hand.

  The lights were pretty! I mean, if you ignored the fact that we could understand the chanting now, and could tell that the necromancers on top of the tower were trying to summon Potema, the Wolf Queen, it was actually very pretty in that ethereal way, even with the whole "manifestation of evil" thing. It just wasn't a good thing!

  On a practical note, we could see several mages performing their ritual on top of the tower, one wandering below us, and a handful of various types of draugr wandering in various levels of the keep. I gestured everyone in for a talk, and said that our usual tactic of going in swinging was probably NOT the best idea, here.

  I had a good bead on several of the draugr, so I suggested a combination of stealth and full-on battle. They agreed that was a good strategy, and took up positions on the earthen ramp that led up to our little landing from the main area. I took out as many as I could with my bow (not the best, but good enough) and then we pressed forward, going as quietly as we could.

  I just want to say that Septim's such a good boy! He earned himself a mammoth steak tonight! He was very quiet and hardly barked the whole time. He's such a good boy!

  Anyway, we went down the ramp and circled through a small tunnel before getting to the keep itself. I hadn't gotten all the draugr, but I had thinned them out enough that we were able to handle them singly, until we ran into several Necromancers on a bridge above us.

  Normally that wouldn't be great for us, but I summoned a fire atronach right up next to them! It kept them occupied while Erandur, Valdimar and I hit them with magic. Those two took a while because they kept bringing back the draugr we'd killed, but I'd looted the draugr already, so they weren't able to do much. Septim and Lydia were behind us, literally keeping the undead off our backs.

  We made our way quietly up to the top of the tower, but the spirit of Potema sensed us coming. She warned the summoners we were there, so we rushed up the steps. By that time there were only a handful of mages left, and like most mages, they were terrible at fighting up close. Septim attacked the main conjurer, and made her stop the ritual while I got out my axe. The other necromancers tried to block me, but I pushed past and let the others take care of them.

  After we killed the main summoner, the ghostly white light - Potema's spirit - rushed out through a hole in the ceiling. I had the distinct feeling it was running away.

  With her gone and the ritual interrupted, we took a moment to look over the tower. There was a large circular altar-type slab that took up most of the space. It was covered in a huge sigil written in blood. Valdimar muttered something under his breath and spat when he saw it. Erandur, like at the Butcher's, gave the markings a close examination with his hand over his heart.

  Dark Magic, obviously. He whispered to me that he'd seen some of the worst of it during his time with Vaermina, and this… This was Bad. He said we had to get back here, to Solitude, as quickly as possible.

  There was a drawbridge that led to a small ledge that took us back near where we had first come in. I hadn't seen it at all when we'd walked past it, but I suppose that's the point. Very handy if you need to escape the cavern in a hurry!

  It wasn't that late when we emerged, and I decided to head towards Solitude to see if there was a more direct route down the hill. There's a stone arch on top of some steps leading down not far from the cave, so I went down.

  I could see some sort of ruin through the mist and the trees, and when we got closer, I froze in my tracks as a voice suddenly filled my head. It was Meridia!

  As before, back when I'd found the Beacon, the others said my eyes glowed white and I spoke in a voice that wasn't entirely my own. Meridia complained about how her temple lay in ruin, and she wanted me to put her Beacon back in its place to claim my destiny!

  When I came back to myself I turned right around and went back up the steps.

  I've had enough of "Destiny" for one day, thank you very much.

  As we went back the way we came (forget looking for another way down, I didn't care) I explained to a very confused Erandur what that was all about. I showed him the Beacon, and he couldn't believe that I had been hauling around a Daedric artifact this entire time.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Me, neither! I can't seem to get it out of my pack!

  I mean, I want the space back, so I'll have to do it eventually, and he was reassured that we'd be cleansing the place of evil, so… It can't be that bad, right?

  But I'll do that later. By the time we got here it was too late to go see Firebeard, so we're calling it a night.

  We're spending the night in the ruins of Meridia's Temple atop Mount Kilkreath, on our way to hopefully kill an evil necromancer.

  I've got first watch.

  Yeah, I'm taking care of the Beacon thing sooner rather than later. At least these ruins have good loot in them, and I got back the space in my bag!

  The morning started quietly. We stopped to see Beirand, Sayma and even the fletcher to sell off our goods. Once we were finished trading, we went to the Blue Palace to see Falk Firebeard and tell him what we had seen. He was, of course, very concerned about what was really going on in Wolfskull Cave, but quite thankful to us for stopping them. 800 septims worth, so I can't complain.

  We're not quite back to where we were, gold-wise, but we're getting close enough that I feel like I can relax.

  Anyway, we were walking away from the Blue Palace and towards the market when I heard Erandur hiss under his breath and felt a tug on my cloak. He was walking behind me, and I realized that Viarmo, the headmaster of the Bard's college, was crossing the path right in front of us!

  Luckily, he didn't pay us any heed and continued on his way between the houses, but I could tell that he was heading towards the center of town. I had planned on getting some food at the stalls, but decided that it was better to abandon that idea and get our asses out of Solitude as quickly as possible.

  Valdimar and Lydia were confused when I quickened my pace and made straight for the city gates. Erandur mouthed a silent "thank you" as the giant doors closed behind us. I could see Viarmo past him, going into the Winking Skeever. He clearly hadn't noticed Erandur. Valdimar and Lydia asked where we were going, and the first thing that came to mind was returning the beacon to Meridia's shrine!

  They seemed satisfied with that, and we went towards the mountain. It's not far from Solitude, so we were soon climbing the steps up to the shrine. I heard an unexpected, but familiar, sound and stopped before we went up to the main altar space.

  There was a Dragon Wall almost right there, partially hidden behind a tree.

  I walked towards it, and could just hear Valdimar say, over the chanting, "I've got her."

  I'm glad he was there. The rushing sound I normally heard as the runes filled my head was particularly sharp this time, like wind howling in a storm. The ground in front of the wall was sloped, and I would have fallen if he hadn't caught me.

  Here's the runes:

  Once I was good to walk again, I went up the steps towards the shrine.

  The main shrine is a large, flat platform, with a huge statue of a winged lady in a robe on it. Aside from the wings, she looks human, and her hands are held skyward. At the base are two small robed figures facing each other, with their hands held out like they're meant to be holding something.

  As I walked on the platform, I stopped and that voice came back to me, ordering me to restore her Beacon to its rightful place, and let her guide me towards my destiny!

  I'd gladly leave some Destiny for the rest of Skyrim, but apparently that's just not in the cards for me.

  So, I put the Beacon in the hands of the small robed figures, and it shot upwards, shining brightly.

  Before I knew it, I started floating, then was pulled up along with the light.

  I was hovering over Skyrim, and could easily see Solitude, Dragon Bridge, the Thalmor Embassy, and a bunch of other places. Once I'd gotten over the terror at being so high up, it was breathtaking! I couldn't quite see the house, but I could almost make out where it was. In front of me was a shimmering ball of light, surrounded by wispy tendrils of light that pulsed and flashed.

  It was Meridia.

  She said that it was time for her to return to Skyrim, but an evil necromancer, Malkoran, had invaded her temple and defiled it. He was even using an artifact of hers to fuel his dark magic. She wanted me to return the light to her temple, get the artifact, and defeat him.

  Seeing as she currently had me suspended a dragon's flight over the landscape, I didn't feel like I had much choice in the matter and said as much. I don't know how an amorphous ball of energy and light can look smug, but she did, and said that I would be wise to do as she wanted me to.

  Then the light flared, and I was being lowered back to the platform. I could hear poor Septim whining as I touched down.

  I stumbled (again) and this time Lydia got me before I tumbled down the steps.

  There was a beam of light shining down from the floating Beacon, through a hole in the platform between the little statues. I head Erandur call from the path that a door had appeared on the side of the platform, too.

  We went inside, and I immediately felt like I needed a bath.

  The air was literally thick with a black fog that made me shudder - It almost felt slimy, and had that sickly-sweet smell of decay. Lydia looked as repulsed as I was, Septim growled and pressed close to me, and even Valdimar was grumbling to himself. I saw Erandur sneer and clutch at his heart, and I could hear him whisper a prayer.

  Yeah, it was BAD. I almost turned around and left!

  Still, we pushed forward.

  There were desecrated corpses around, along with a fair bit of loot. After a short ways, we came upon a room with a crystal orb like the Beacon set into a divot in a pedestal. The beam of light from the Beacon was shining down into it. We noticed another crystal high up on the wall.

  It wasn't hard to figure out what I needed to do. Clearly, the crystals moved the light like a mirror, so I picked up the crystal and the light beam bounced into the crystal on the wall. The light kept going into the next area, so we followed it.

  On our way, we found creepy ghosts with glowing red eyes that looked like they were made from the same icky fog that ran through the place. They were hard to kill, and once they were dead they turned into a puddle of slimy goo.

  I don't like looting them. It's so disgusting, but they have weapons we can sell, and gold, so it's worth it.

  We kept going through the temple, following the path of light and resetting the crystals into their proper alignments. The fog didn't disappear as I'd hoped when the light went though, but at least it wasn't everywhere.

  We finally reached a door that took us back outside, onto a balcony. It felt good to be back in the fresh air, and we could see the sun starting to set. Above us, the beam of light continued through more crystals set on top of a handful of pillars that led across a narrow walkway, and towards the door to this place, set into the hillside.

  Before we came in I found a chest with a tricky lock. It took me four tries, but I was getting tired. Valdimar got the money from the bet this time. Still, the chest was full of some nice weapons, a few potions, and gold.

  The door opened into the chamber we're in right now. There were four of those horrible shadow ghosts in here, but we took care of them. I know if we move the crystal on the platform above us it'll unlock one of the two doors in here to the next part, but we're dead tired.

  I've got a fire going and the others are sleeping soundly. Well, mostly. I had to kick Lydia to stop her snoring, then calm Erandur down. He sleeps well most nights, but he's still prone to nightmares. He doesn't wake up from them, as least as far as I know, and they're not so bad a little nudge won't settle him. I can only partially understand him when he talks, but it's usually just nonsense.

  I'm sorely temped to see if he'll carry on a conversation, but I'm afraid I'll wake Valdimar. He's a light sleeper. Septim's weaseled his head under Erandur's arm, and looks very pleased with himself.

  Well, I'm going to finish my wine and my cheese, then poke at Lydia.

  We're back at the manor, and I'm not doing great.

  Fighting Malkoran was literally the hardest thing we've ever done!

  We woke up, broke camp, and had a quick breakfast before getting the two doors open. Nothing big happened, there weren't even any more enemies, just some nasty traps. As I suspected, the main door that we built the fire in front of (just in case) was the one leading to the catacombs where Malkoran was holed up.

  The door to the large chamber he was in was open, but luckily, he and the SIX shadow ghosts he had guarding him didn't notice us right away. I could see him making magical-looking gestures over an altar-ish space that looked… Alive with dark tendrils of evil power (?) that seemed to be producing the almost sticky black fog that we'd been going through. There was also the beam of light, focused on something that wasn't a crystal set into a pedestal. At first we though it was a staff sticking out of there, but it was the handle of a sword. It was the artifact he was using to power his magic.

  The necromancer seemed… Busy, so we took a moment to make a plan.

  I had a scroll called "Call to Arms" that would make us stronger fighters for ten whole minutes. I would cast that, then poison my bow with a paralyze potion and shoot Malkoran. Lydia pointed out that every powerful mage we've fought so far has been absolutely terrible at direct combat, and he was entirely unarmored. I couldn't even see a dagger on him. So, once he was paralyzed, I would rush in and just start hitting him while the others kept the shades off my back.

  Fairly simple plan, all told, but it worked!

  It wasn't easy, GODS no, but we didn't die!

  I used the scroll on us, paralyzed Malkoran with my bow, then ducked past the ghosts coming at us so I could start hacking at him with my axe. I made sure to poison it every chance I could. I made a very nasty one recently that totally stops your ability to regenerate magicka for several minutes. I hit him with that, first, then started using Slow and poisoning his magicka.

  I'm not great with weapons, but I'm strong enough to stagger someone if I hit hard enough, but he was really good at Wards. Actually getting a hit in was way harder than it usually is with mages. He also used some powerful Frost spell that nearly killed me each time it hit! Jokes was on him, I have a lot of potions and I can and will drink several shots at once.

  The fight seemed to drag on forever, and I was tired, cold, and getting more and more angry at him. It felt like he was shrugging off hits that would kill most people! Why wouldn't he just die?! I let loose a Shout, the one I'd learned in Curalmil's Tomb that gave Valdimar chills.

  Malkoran staggered, and strange web of purple light covered him that looked like pottery cracking. I'm not entirely sure what happened, but he seemed to sense that he was in trouble. I switched to my dagger for more speed, and used a Flame Cloak spell before diving back in close to fight.

  He was already weak to fire, and kept trying to get away from me to keep from getting burned. I drove him against the back wall, into a little corner next to a pillar with a crystal on it. It was hard, but in the end I managed to finish him off by breaking his ward with a side swipe, then sticking my dagger up under his ribs.

  Malkoran's body fell and I thought we were done, but then a dark shadow, HIS corrupted ghost, rose from the body in front of me!

  Thankfully, the others had taken care of the rest of the shades by then and were able to give their full attention to Malkoran's spirit.

  He didn't last long.

  Once he was banished, Meridia's voice echoed through the chamber. She told me to take the sword from its place, and I was too tired to argue. I pulled it out from the pedestal, and we were all surrounded by a bright light.

  When the light faded, I was back up in the sky, floating above Skyrim with Meridia in front of me.

  She said that she wanted me to take the sword, called Dawnbreaker, and use it to spread her light across all of Skyrim. She wanted me to be her champion, purge corruption from the land…

  Yeah, no. I told her I'd take the sword, but she could find someone else to spread her religion. I'd had enough.

  She said my wishes didn't matter. As long as I carried the sword, I would be carrying her light to the world. She then very unceremoniously plonked me back on the platform, where the others were waiting for me.

  Of course, the first thing I did when we got back here was lock that damn thing in a display case. We can all tell that it's powerful, but I don't want anything to do with it.

  Obviously, we decided to come back to the house. I was starting to feel the effects of drinking all those potions at once, and we did have a lot of loot to sell.

  I remembered the Stormcloak encampment just down the hill, so we stopped there instead of going all the way through Solitude. I sold off the goods, bought a really nice enchanted Elven greatsword for Lydia (It damages Stamina, too!) and even did a bit of alchemy there, because why not?

  We walked down to the the mill from there, bought more lumber, then crossed the water to the swamp to get back home.

  The walk back was freezing, and would have been quiet except we ran into something Valdimar identified as a "Chaurus Reaper."

  It was a disgusting, giant, bug-creature that looked like the dremora version of an earwig. It had big, sickle-like mandibles, heavy plates, and it spit poison!

  I managed to get a chitin plate off of it after we killed it, and Valdimar said it could be made into armor. I was looking it over as we walked back to the house, and realized that it looked sort of familiar. I asked the others if this looked like what the Flamer used, and Erandur said I was correct. He'd heard that they raise chaurus to guard their homes and use for parts.

  Lydia took the plate and turned it around in her hands, tapping on it and feeling the weight. If it could be formed into something not horribly ugly, yes, it would make fine light armor.

  I'll keep it. Maybe someday I can learn to make something nice out of it?

  We got back to the house and warmed up while we talked about what our next move would be. Clearly, there were plenty of Daedric artifacts out there. Much like the Sanguine Rose, the Dawnbreaker sword wasn't evil in and of itself, but it did hold an incredible amount of power. Erandur destroyed the Skull of Corruption, so we didn't have to worry about that, but there's definitely more.

  That's not including all the other legendary things we could find! We already found the White Phial. Who knows what else could be out there? Valdimar grabbed "Lost Legends" from the library and he's flipping through it, while Erandur and Lydia are talking about whether or not we should look for Daedric versus more conventional artifacts.

  As for me, I'm just trying to drink as much water as I can.

  I downed A LOT of potions while fighting Malkoran, and my body is not happy. Erandur suggested doing some light work to help my body "process" everything, so I made more nails and did some small decorating tasks. I put up some shelves and wall scones, built a bench; that sort of thing.

  I still wasn't feeling that great after dinner - Valdimar made some very mild soup for me - so I'm just writing while I finish this cup of water. I'm going to turn in early, and see how I feel in the morning.