Well, I'm starting to think Sovngarde wasn't so bad after all.
This is where trapped souls go after their energy is spent? Yikes. I almost feel bad. It looks like this is yet another afterlife filled almost entirely with my sworn enemies. And by definition, anyone who's here because of me has a perfectly understandable vendetta against me.
But Serana and I do meet one fellow who's a bit nice. Or, rather, distracted and distraught by the fate of his horse, Arvak, who's been trapped in the Cairn with him. My unbeating heart breaks for him.
Or do I even have a heart? Argonian, after all. Maybe it's a system of glands.
Serana doesn't quite get it, but I'm going to do anything to get this guy's horse out of here for him. Every time I see Arvak's tormented specter galloping madly across the ashen fields, I imagine if he were Assfalloff, my beloved friend who I had for maybe two hours before a hag killed him.
But the Soul Cairn is huge, and finding Arvak's skull to release his soul is proving difficult. Serana, meanwhile, would prefer that we keep looking for her mother. I would prefer we kill everything we see. Someone must know where the horse's skull is.
But our search goes on for hours, with no luck. I stumble across more ghosts, more undead, and a spiky thing that turns grand gems into black gems, which is actually quite useful.
I even soultrap a ghost, inside the Soul Cairn, which raises its own set of questions.
But finally, under a little pagoda a ways off the main road, I see the skull.
I cut aside the specters guarding it--really, the undead have nothing better to do but keep a man and his horse apart in the afterlife?--and retrieve the skull. Arvak's owner appears and thanks me profusely, and says if I want, I can summon Arvak's soul.
Assfalloff rides again!
Okay, so it's not really Assfalloff, but it could be. All horses probably look the same once you strip them down to a pile of black, smoldering bones, right?
Well, now that I've found the friend I haven't seen in months, I decide we can go help Serana find the mother she hasn't seen in thousands of years. It's far easier. Also, her mother looks fine, so Serana should be grateful for the small things.
Valerica says the Scroll is in the Cairn, but to reach it, we'll have to kill some things called Keepers holding up the shield around Valerica's prison. Well, I think I already killed one of them as an afterthought, so it's no big deal to get the other two.
That one of them thought hiding on top of a floating rock was a good idea only makes it easier.
But what is decidedly not easy is the Soul Cairn's guardian, who shows up once we kill the Keepers and head to where the Scroll's being kept. Durnehviir, the captive soul of a dragon, rightly puts Alduin to shame when it comes to combat.
Well, one dragon deserves another, and I'm the deadliest of them all. So when I shout for a thunderstorm, in a place that's probably never known rain, I'm not actually surprised that it works.
Durnehviir and the dozens of skeletons he summoned are shortly ripped apart by lightning, leaving the Scroll open for retrieval.
Well, now that I've got my hands on yet another Elder Scroll, I suppose there's no harm in seeing what's inside, right?
Serana rolls her eyes and helps me back to my feet. Valerica tells us that we've got what we needed, but she can't leave the Cairn yet. If she does, Harkon will kill her--apparently the two of them have rather different views on how vampires should behave, and I find myself more in keeping with Valerica's. I think it's a bit dreary staying around here, though, and wonder why she can't just go hide in Elsweyr, somewhere that isn't bristling with the undead and clouds of ash made from Akatosh knows what.
Actually, as I discover upon heading back toward the portal, Valerica's probably the only person who doesn't want out of this place.
But I'm happy to listen to what Durnehviir has to say--I'm always eager to gain the respect of one of my brothers. Dragons are supposed to be these great, incredible beings, so it's nice to see them behaving with some modicum of civility for a change. And on the plus side, having an undead dragon come to my aid when I need it could be useful.
In any case, I've had my fill of the Soul Cairn. I got an Elder Scroll, a dragon, and most importantly, a new horse that presumably can't be killed any more than he already is.
But if that's what the alternative to Sovngarde looks like, then I'm sure glad I became a vampire. I think Skyrim's the only afterlife for me.
