After a few days, Ahnasha was able to declare her ritual a success, by her own judgment. With her magic, she was able to identify changes in her own soul that were consistent with what he had read to expect about the process. It certainly helped to calm her worries, though it was only after another month that she started to see the tangible effects of her magic. She felt more lively as she gained back some of the stamina she had not even been aware she had lost over the years. Her reactions became a bit quicker, she did not feel tired as often. Not to mention, she stopped finding strands of grey fur on her body. Unfortunately, the way events unfolded did not remain so positive for the pack for long.
About two months after Meesei’s meeting with Marod and Lunise Vile’s forces launched the single largest and most damaging attack of the entire war thusfar. Within mere days of one another, the Narsis, Sentinel, Solitude, and Cloudrest clans were all assaulted by large forces of enemy soldiers wielding the soul-tearing gas. They were destroyed completely and utterly, with only a handful of survivors from each clan, mostly scouts and other individuals who were away from their clans at the time. The Daggerfall clan was also targeted on the last day, but thanks to the investigations of Saras’ agents from the first attack, some sloppiness from the enemy, and the propylon chambers they had built connecting Daggerfall and Evermore, they were able to reinforce the clan, repel the attack, and relocate them from their compromised clan. Even so, the attacks were devastating in every sense of the word. The sudden loss of four clans was a significant reduction in the overall power and influence of Tamriel’s lycan clans. They lost coin, manpower, and influence in the affected regions.
As it turned out, the enemy had evidently rushed their attacks, as they were less stringent about covering their tracks than usual. As a result, Saras was able to deploy agents to gather a considerable amount of information that enabled the clans to carry out quite a few retaliatory strikes. However, such small victories were not enough for Meesei. She did not admit it to anyone, but she considered the attacks a failure on her part. She had failed to protect her clans, and therefore had failed to prevent countless lycan deaths. In the aftermath of the attacks, Meesei started to allow herself to spend more time with Mora’s Black Book. She had already gained great power from Apocrypha, and she felt that the more powerful she became, the more able she would be to fight against Vile and fulfill her duties as Champion. She hoped to find some kind of knowledge that would help combat the enemy’s poison gas, but failing that, she would eagerly learn of any kind of magical ability that she felt would be worth the effort.
It was a slow progression at first. Meesei gave herself an additional day per week, and another hour for each session, to explore Apocrypha. For the most part, she was held back from drastically expanding that time by her duties. While the rest of her pack were still regularly carrying out missions, Meesei herself needed to keep enchanting new propylons to build up their propylon network. She still gradually increased her time in Apocrypha, but it was not until after about a year, when the propylon network was complete, that she was able to add extra days per week to her time in Apocrypha. She grew more reclusive, more obsessed with finding the secret to ending the war quickly. She still carried out missions from time to time, but she was gradually taking a less and less direct role in the fight against Vile. By the end of a second year, Lorag was taking the lead on nearly all of the pack’s missions. Granted, that was not to say that they were not making any progress against the enemy. Saras had been able to use what they had learned from the aftermath of the previous year’s attacks to great effect. They were able to identify and eliminate enemy agents, disrupt their network of contacts, and even plant infiltrators within enemy ranks. Combined with a steadily increasing flow of needed ingredients from the Empire and Dominion for their antidote, and they were able to push back effectively against the enemy. Attacks against the clans became less frequent, and attacks against the enemy became more effective. Several enemy strongholds fell, and Saras was becoming more adept at rooting out enemy agents. In particular, he did not have any restrictions with investigating government officials. He could identify infiltrators in the Dominion and Empire, then pass on that knowledge to their allies for them to neutralize the threat. It did not end the threat they posed, but they were able to place delays on the enemy’s agenda. The threat still remained that they might convince Marod and Lunise’s superiors to call for an extermination of the lycans, but they were giving themselves more time to bring an end to the war.
Unfortunately, despite their successes, Meesei did nothing to back away from her obsessions. She still spent increasing amounts of time in Apocrypha. By the third year, the situation was dire. She spent far more time in Apocrypha than out of it. She often spent days at a time with the Book, depriving her body of food, water, and rest in the process. With so little exercise and sustenance, she started wasting away before her pack’s eyes. Her former strong, athletic, and even attractive figure became like that of an impoverished beggar. Even as a lycan, there were hardly any muscles on her bones, her scales and feathers lost much of their color, and her ribs were all easily visible. She had been confronted many times before, by her council, and by her pack, to stop using the book. However, she had stopped trying to argue and simply deferred to her authority to make such decisions for herself. The Black Book now never left her person. Whenever she was not using it, she kept it in her bag. She had developed a tendency to become angry when talking about it, and with the sheer about of power she had amassed, she could be frightening to be around. It would simply not be possible to stop her by force. Despite Saras’ efforts to keep rumors of Meesei’s ailing health from spreading, he could not stop people from seeing her when she did happen to walk through the city. At one point, a high ranking Altmer from one of the Summerset Isles’ clans, frustrated by their supposed leader’s reclusiveness and apparent weakness, traveled to the Silent City itself to challenge her for her position. Even with Meesei’s obvious physical weakness, she still accepted and killed him seemingly easily, and without remorse.
Among Meesei’s pack, it was apparent that they would have to do something to help her, else they would certainly lose her eventually. The obsession she had with Apocrypha was almost like someone who had been touched by Sheogorath, so no one expected it to be easy. They had tried before and failed, but when Lorag called them all together for a meeting, there was a sense of absolute determination about him. He had not even needed to tell them the purpose of the meeting, for there was only one thing that it could be. They had to cure her of her obsession; anything less could mean her doom.
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