#welcome to 'ancano is forcefully pulled from his own hell kicking and screaming: the fic'

[throughtrialbyfire]

𝐖𝐈𝐏 𝐖𝐞𝐝𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐝𝐚𝐲 ♥

hi all!!!! i climb out of my draugr crypt at last!! a lot's been going on irl for me, but i hope now to be more active for the most part.

thank you to everyone who's tagged me in wip wednesdays the past few months, and thank you to @captain-of-silvenar for tagging me this week!!

tagging @skyrim-forever @archangelsunited @umbracirrus @dirty-bosmer @saltymaplesyrup @oblivions-dawn @thequeenofthewinter and anyone who wants to participate!

this week, i bring to you a long section of chapter 1 of my rewritten/revamped fic, An Inner Sanctity. hopefully, if all goes well, i'll have the rewrite up bit by bit later this year. ancano has just woken up after being knocked out at the college of winterhold, and he's… going through it. he's nasty, as usual. don't expect him to change until later in the fic lol <3

The only thing he noticed was how dark the room was, lit only by a hearth or some other cooking fire, based on the crackle and the meager sense of light he could note if he turned his head. He couldn't find the strength to do so, as the shooting, electric pain dug itself into him like a hot knife on a blacksmith's anvil and ran down through him in wild arcs, starting in his lower spine and firing through his shoulders and down into his legs until his head began to pound and he found himself sweating profusely in the silent room. He strangled a cry midway from his lips and instead grit his teeth and sucked in air, ragged and noisy. He had to suppress it. He had no idea where he was, and the tension in his head only grew, pops of color behind his eyes and neck tight with the amount of effort it was taking him to remain quiet. He struggled through slow breaths in an attempt to get everything under control, his body coated in a thin sheen of sweat as he did so. His lungs ached, but he tried again and again to keep his inhales and exhales at an even pace, and when he succeeded, he closed his eyes and tried to surmise anything about the room. There were wooden walls near him. He'd got a glimpse in the middle of whatever fit had come over him. And there was a bed beneath him, he could run his fingers over the linens and know this. A heavy quilt laid over his legs, and he figured that's why he couldn't move them, and made the decision to try. He kicked one leg, then the other, but they mostly remained in place like stubbornly rusted carts laiden with ore. He cursed in a breathy hiss and tried again, and while they did move, it just intensified the pain in the muscles, and he groaned as his vision swam with dots. Whatever had happened to him was enough to leave the Altmer without any sense of time or reason. He was, in some manner, glad to find himself alive. This did not fix matters much, but it did lend a helping hand.

Logically, he knew it was not hours that it took for the pain to dull, but rather half of one if he had to hazard a guess. That didn't negate the fact that, to him, it seemed much longer. Could have been days, for all he knew, until the aches began to soften in his body and his skull, dissipating into simple thuds behind his eyes. His ears rushed with blood, every ounce of flesh on him an uncomfortable feeling in his senses. He peered down and lifted the blanket slightly to see the collar of a simple tunic, nothing like his Thalmor robes, and swore to himself in a mental note to get back at whoever had put him in this position. He scoffed at the color of the tunic as the revelation that it was of Nord make made a home in his thoughts. By Auriel, whichever fool had replaced his clothing with that of the less… Enlightened, he settled on, was going to pay in ways they could never foresee. He looked to the ceiling and saw wood above him. Even the effort of moving his neck was monumental; every piece of his body burned as though he'd been speared through with scorching irons, and the notion of not knowing what day it was made him only feel worse. He did wonder in a brief manner how long he'd been asleep. He didn't wish to dwell on it, but the reality of his position only reinforced the need to know, because to anyone else in the Dominion, it would appear as if he'd abandoned his post if he did not send word that he was alive. This was what got his heart pumping. He tried to move again, forcing himself upright. The pain struck tenfold, and he gasped and gargled on it, not wanting to know the sort of expression he made as he attempted to toss the blankets aside. He got as far as wrapping one hand around them, then holding them up, but as if in a state of postmortem, he could not force his fingers to curl harder or wrist to move further. He could hear through the rushing of blood again in his temples that someone had entered the room, and whoever it was began to swipe his forehead with a cold cloth and make any attempt to get him to lie back down, but nothing on Nirn could bring his vision back from the inky void which had overtaken it. He heard only garbled noises for speech that made his ears ring, and he found his back again supine on the mattress. He gasped hard for air, and a chair's scraping made him so miserable it may as well have been the same as someone sticking nails into his head, and the stranger worked to comb his hair back from his forehead and swipe the cloth over his skin. "Get away from me," he managed out in huffs.

The stranger's voice sounded like temple bells - loud. "I'm trying to help." "I said, get away, or I will turn every measely little inch of your puny body to ash." He'd intended for it to come out more like a yell, but it barely made its way above a whisper. The stranger didn't move. Just adjusted in the creaking chair and pulled the blankets back into the former position, and ran the rag over his forehead again. They swept it down his cheeks and his neck, then set it back in a metal bowl sloshing with water, and took brush, dipped the bristles in, and as gently as the stranger could, glided it through the front of his hair in order to keep it out of his way. Through the heavy veil of his own senseless agony, Ancano panted at the effort merely rising off the mattress had taken from him. He kept his focus on the ceiling until he could turn his neck to face the other, to get a good look at his captor. The long, dark curls and the red vest, the too-large tunic and the belt that held normally held a sword, spot now vacant. The last memory that he had of this figure was that of them trying to kill him. Through his frayed consciousness, he narrowed his eyes, brow knit. To say he was baffled would be an understatement. "Athenath?" he choked out, the figure's eyes locking on his own. His voice was abnormally hoarse and the other Altmer managed a nervy grin. "Well, Athenath, fetch me my uniform. I promise, I shall not mention you to the embassy if you do."

The younger elf shook his head. "I'm not going to do that. And in your state, I doubt you could walk a step away from that bed." When Ancano made an attempt to try, what looked almost like worry crashed over the other's features, Athenath having to assist him in the simple task of sitting upright so he'd not wind up laying back on the mattress coated in sweat. "Hey, don't do that, you're not…" He didn't like the way that they trailed off. "Not what, you simpleton?" Athenath looked like he was subduing a sneer. "Not well. You're not well." "Well, that makes two of us. Mark my words, you have just sealed your fate," he hissed through clenched teeth. The younger Altmer rolled his round eyes and went to the pot over the fire. He stirred at something fragrant, a smell he must have not noticed until now, the scents of leek and Imperial spices and meat all churning over one another in his mind. The other pulled the wooden spoon out and set it on a tray near the hearth, cloth beneath, and took a silver pitcher in one hand and a cup in the other. "If you can keep water down, we'll move on to broth." The statement was matter-of-fact, and he did not like the sound of it. He thought about killing him where he stood, but the temptation of water was all too much. His tongue had never been so dry, like sandstone in the crevice of his mouth. He'd never known he could get so thirsty, and he did not say a word about it. It would be pathetic to ask like a dog or a child for a sip, but he did not have to, as the other brought the cup over and set it on the makeshift nightstand next to him. Then, the other began to shift his pillows and adjust the older elf so that he was more upright and less likely to spill on himself, and the mere mental image made him wince with embarrassment. Even the idea was enough to make him want to curl up under the quilts. "Here," Athenath passed the cup into his hands. He didn't know what sort of metal it was made from, but he would have to guess Dwemer due to the coloration and weight. Dwemer cups were always a little lighter than other sorts, even glass, which to scholars was a perplexing issue. Ancano stared at his fingers and wondered if they appeared frail in the light as a trick of it, or he'd truly been out cold for longer than a couple of hours. He suppressed the urge to ask. Instead, he lifted the cup with a momentous effort to his lips and gave a slow sip. If he downed it too fast, he'd run the risk of getting ill, and so he settled on being easy with his attempts at regaining his strength. "And here." As he went to set the cup aside, Athenath picked up the brush and passed it into his hands as well. "I figure you may wanna brush your hair." He scoffed. Of course he would. He took the silver object into his palm, bristles of fine mammoth hair marked with the smallest here-and-there strands of his own, and wondered again at how long he'd slept. He looked to the other, skeptical of the actions, then got to work untangling and smoothing down the lengths of white. He was beginning to get a better look at his surroundings; the hearth, the wooden floors, and the window to the other side of the room which he couldn't quite see out of, but knew there was the faintest shine of daylight. The chimney was stone and a chest laid near the entryway, but the threshold looked more like an arched passage to a foyer. Sophisticated, he thought. Surprisingly.