It's Not So Cold in Coldharbour
This is just the story that accompanies the above artwork I posted a few days ago!
Stops-His-Heart was pallid, very much so for an Argonian. Though he shied away from the light, sitting as still as the dead against the wall, it was evident his scales were a cold white-purple- a far cry from his original shimmering black. His pale flesh showed between the gaps in his light armour and every time Bloodies-His-Face gazed upon it, he felt forced to confront the new reality. His thoughts roiled and were plagued by flashes of that day- his shallow breaths taken and his lungs aching for rest, as he ran as fast as he could to save his love.
His expression quivered as he stared down at the pewter bowl in his hand. He set it upon the table and took out a knife in his right hand. The moment Bloodies slashed through the under-scales below his other wrist, the bars slammed and he could hear Stops' deep breaths- heavy as always. Bloodies didn't tear his attention away from the bowl as he applied pressure to his arm, knowing he could not bear to see the look on his love's face. Not again. He just tried his best to ignore the sounds of thirsting inhalation, which were punctuated by the dripping of his blood into the bowl. All else apart from those two noises dancing with each other was a silence backed only by the outside winds.
When the bowl was halfway full, Bloodies staunched the bleeding with a spark of flame to cauterize the cut. He winced barely, looking to the other healing scars on his arm as he bound the new wound with a poulticed bandage. He replaced his left gauntlet and then brought the bowl over to the cell warily. Stops moved without a word on his hissing breaths, the bars rattling slightly. Bloodies then put the bowl down just within reach of the bars. It was snatched swiftly before his eyes, with only the faintest blur of Stops' black leather glove reaching out covetously.
Bloodies' watched then as drops of his blood splattered on the floor and lead his gaze back to the sight that haunted his nightmares. Hood drawn back, the cold light of Coldharbour streaming through grates illuminated Stops' face. His reptilian eyes white and streaked with red, and black circles shadowed them like he'd never known sleep. Blood dripped carelessly down his chin from the bowl as he turned it up and supped it vigorously like nothing else mattered. Bloodies kept trying to turn away, but he couldn't. He just watched, in a vain hope to force himself to accept that his lover was now a vampire.
When the bowl failed to provide the nourishment he still craved, Stops tossed it aside as he had done the others with a rasping exhale. He then looked at Bloodies- those blood-crazed eyes holding still for that moment. This was when Bloodies, regardless of his own feelings, had to look away. But he did not. He stared into his lover's eyes, throwing his fear to the howling winds outside. And when Stops spoke, for the first time in days, Bloodies could feel it happening.
'Release me, my sweet,' Stops crooned, the crimson stain upon his pale face-scales belying the soothing tone of his voice. Though every fiber of his being refused to do so, Bloodies found himself stepping forward in a daze. In his mind, Stops was the same subtle charmer as he had been before and he did his love a disservice by keeping him caged up. Bloodies took the key chain from his belt and started to unlock the door, even as a lingering thought warned him not to.
But too little too late. The split-second the lock clicked, Stops threw the cell door open and flung Bloodies aside. He clambered to stand from where his lover's vampiric strength had hurled him, hearing the same hungry breathing from before. As the fog in his mind cleared and his image of Stops returned to vapid scales, Bloodies half-expected his life to be over at that moment. But when he sat up, he saw Stops hadn't moved from where the cell door hung ajar. His gloved hands gripped the bars of the door instead as he just stood there, trembling.
As Bloodies sat up, he saw the fanged teeth stained with blood that Stops' bore. His breath seethed between them as he shook timidly- a far cry from his prior motionless appearance. Before Bloodies could stand, Stops was gone.
'Stops!' Bloodies shouted after him, and made his way out in pursuit.
Bloodies stepped out into the Hollow City, where guild warriors and mages cried out nearby. He followed the sound of the commotion, and there a guild mage laid on the cobblestones bleeding out from her neck as a healer tended to her. Bloodies skirted the gathering crowd to get ahead of sentries shouting his lover's position. He ran out the gate and into the craggy black foothills that lay beyond, the ominous midnight-blue skyline of Coldharbour beckoning to him with a chilling breeze.
A loose spattered trail of blood, not so apparent to anyone who wasn't already searching for it, lead Bloodies to the top of a cold stone cliff where a large chained wall stood. He drew his sword instinctively, but with shuddering gulps of air he tensed his grip on the handle. His love- now a monster- stood by the chained wall with his war mask and hood donned over his obsidian-black horns. He was standing still, though his hood wavered slightly in the breeze.
As Bloodies walked toward Stops, his lover spluttered and doubled over slightly. Blood burst through the gap in his mask for a mouth and dripped down his chin. Stops then stared back at his love, who stood before him with sword drawn.
'You know... What you have to do...' Stops whispered harshly, as though the very words were coated in venom as he forced them up through his throat.
Bloodies stared back at his love, his lips parted. 'I can't... I won't.' To say this went against everything he swore upon and stood for, but Bloodies held firm by his words and placed his sword in the dirt. He took a step forward toward his love.
Suddenly, Bloodies was gasping for air- his windpipe seized and neck trapped in Stops' grip. For a rogue- someone who favoured poise over strength- it was astonishing for Stops to lift an armoured knight aloft.
'Why not!?' Stops shouted, shattering the solemn tone he normally had. 'I'm a monster, Red- you swore to destroy monsters!' Though Bloodies grasped weakly at the leather vice at his throat, he didn't fight back. Stops then let go of him and shrunk back against the wall. Bloodies collapsed to the ground, taking sharp lungfuls of air and coughing heavily. 'I- I don't want to hurt you... Never you...' Stops admitted sadly. He pressed his back against the wall, as Bloodies crawled through the dirt, wanting to disappear into its fortification.
Stops then felt Bloodies throw himself onto his breastplate, and he could hear his shallow gasps become broken sobs.
'Your hands...' Bloodies cried, tears running down the sides of his maw as he leaned his head against the cold steel of Stops' breastplate. 'They're so cold... Why are you so cold...?' Bloodies knew it was a pointless question to ask, but for the last few moments he held onto the fantasy that it was just a horrible dream. But even with the gloved bracers on Stops' hands, Bloodies could still feel his chilling grip upon his neck-scales. 'I just... Couldn't save you...'
Stops stared over his lover's crumpled form, then past to the black fortresses of Molag Bal that dominated the apocalyptic horizon. He then held a hand upon Bloodies' head, amongst his horns, which seemed to make him cry more as he hugged and clutched.
'There, there...' Stops whispered, his tone soothing but not in the slightest filled with malign intent. 'It's okay, my love. It'll be okay...' For a moment, Stops had some hope and abandoned his suicidal plans as he just held onto Bloodies. He then pondered on what he had said. 'Now that you mention it... I did wonder why it's not so cold in Coldharbour.' Bloodies choked on another sob but then stifled his noise at this point and instead just trembled in his sorrow, while Stops held onto both his love and hope. 'We'll be okay.'