They always want to summon him on rainy days.
Terrible weather, mind you very much. Sure, you get the romantic louts, and there’s nothing proving you get sick from such a thing. But soaked shoes are a pain, not to mention evil.
No, I don’t mean that evil as THAT kind evil. At least, the way a lot interpret the phrase as such. It’s just a silly word. Like butter. The word butter, not actually butter. Most things aren’t good or bad, they just are.
Like these summoners.
Young people, idealistic, hopeful, radiant. They grow out of it, they do.
The first one was a young woman from Breton. Or maybe she was Breton. Brown-haired and almond-eyed, if you insist on knowing the details. She clearly wasn’t born of crows like some of the ilk.
The second was a young Redguard. He was clearly the younger of the trio, bright eyed and confident. The warmest of candles always get snuffed the quickest.
The third was a young Imperial. He was short, more markings on his face than those eyesore moons that lurk in the sky. why weren’t THOSE yanked down to the ground? Yank him to the ground while we were at it.
He, you know, our lord, spoke from the shrine. He demanded a unique offering from the three, or two-plus-one, if that fancies your numerological speaking. Or perhaps one-plus-two, or one-and-one-and-one.
For the first, he demanded a disgruntled cat. Nobody’s in particular, he said, any cat would be fine. She seemed perfectly relieved that he didn’t care about whether it was alive or dead. In fact, I wasn’t even sure if he specified a cat, they just happened to find one.
For the second, he demanded mud. Mud. Brilliant, isn’t it? Why couldn’t they see the ingenuity in it? Where better to gain perspective of the natural world that by watching the Worm wriggle through its Earth Cage? It wasn’t as though he was trying to be subtle.
For the third, he kept going on about his fork. The mortals couldn’t seem to procure the one he told about in great detail, so they had to settle for the one they kept in their knapsack. Terribly odd, keeping such a dangerous thing so close to the skin.
He must have been satisfied with it, for he stepped out of a hole in the rain and greeted them in an outfit so dapper. I do appreciate a gentleman who can maintain a fashionable taste in apparel, unlike his snobbish consort.
It was quite unlike our lord to take personal interest in such relatively new worshippers. Or perhaps it was very much like him. He didn’t say, so nobody bothered to ask.
And the youngsters, the oddballs, start going off about how they adore his Madness. One of them goes on a tangent about jokes and cheese, as if that were the master’s very sphere.
Whatever favor they asked, Lord Sheogorath seemed relatively uninterested. Sure the gifts were a nice thought, but nice thoughts weren’t very interesting, were they? Everyone wants to think they covet nice thoughts when painful thoughts were often the easiest to recollect.
He figured they were as bored, summoning him of all people. He told them about how madness was a gift that could not be priced. And since they gave gifts to him, he would bestow one onto them.
He took the top off the cat, and the mad thing started shrieking about some nonsense of looney ladders and darkness. The Cat must have been fascinated by the first one’s eyes, for that’s what he immediately went after.
Can’t blame him. How often do you see a pretty pair of eyes?
The second one seemed downright horrified when the worms began to dance around his form. Bad show on his part, when he slipped and was embraced by more worms coming from the ground. At least the ones he thought he saw, anyway.
The third one seemed to be the brightest, for he didn’t try to part with the offering. In fact, he seemed very interested in seeing how his very insides looked. I won’t spoil what he saw; if you want to know so badly, I’m sure arrangements could be made someplace else.
Who’d have thought a fork could be so sharp, eh?
By the time he came to his senses (or maybe he had the pleasure of losing them), he was screaming as loudly and terribly as the other two were. Our lord just bobbed his head to the music and doffed his hat before shutting the rain door behind him.
The three still continued to scream, getting rain and mud all over themselves.
They always want to summon him on rainy days.
Graphic by Coupleofkooks, DeviantArt