Regent Cassipia, a leader in the insidious Scaled Court, sent a messenger requesting that we meet at an old derelict farm on the outskirts of the town of Dragonstar. She claims that she only wants to make Nirn better, in her own erroneous way; whilst the Celestial Serpent, much like the Yokudan serpent god Satakal, wants to destroy the world and start over. That she says, makes the Serpent our ‘common enemy’.

She says that she can not openly oppose the Serpent whilst maintaining her high rank in the echelons of the Scaled Court. So she must employ subterfuge and an accomplice; or a believable scapegoat should all go wrong. The serpent, having failed to build its elemental army to the east, now plots to build an army of Mantikoras to the west. These powerful and cunning beasts are bred by alchemical measure, combing the worst traits of some of Tamriel’s most pernicious predators.

Of course I should not trust a member of the Scaled Court, especially one seemingly so willing to betray their own master; betrayal is most common to those of little conscience. Yet the true betrayal in all this is perhaps not Cassipia’s, rather it is the Scaled Courts betrayal of Tamriel. That so many are willing to betray their families, friends, and selves is a tragedy. In all the history of mer and men, mute compliance in the face of tyranny is the perhaps the greatest betrayal of them all.

S.K