“Hey guys,” I say. “I’ve got a small errand for the Mages Guild to do, so unless anyone else wants to make a quick trip to the Shivering Isles, I’ll see you later.”

“Pass,” Eran says.

“Hard pass,” Ilara adds.

“You’re insane,” Merry comments.

“Tell me about it later,” Gelur says.

“Okay, since you guys are wisely staying behind, could you do me a favor and recap our new friend on why I changed my name to avoid my ex?”

“Will do,” Eran says.

“This I have to hear,” Gelur says.

I head back to the Elden Root branch (heh) of the Mages Guild and go let Valaste know I’m ready to do something insane. She’s excited about the prospect, and seems to be enjoying herself quite a bit. Also I feel like she’s been flirting with Shalidor. Not that it’s any of my business, but I hope she’s not expecting a long-term relationship with a dead Nord. Who is still glowing purple. When he leaves this world again, he’ll be returning to Sovngarde, while she… may wind up in the Shivering Isles with how much she’s gushing about Sheogorath’s genius and witty wordplay.

In any case, speculations on the final resting place of people’s souls notwithstanding, Valaste sends me to speak to Shalidor to open a portal to the Shivering Isles for me.

The location we step out of the portal at looks like it could be anywhere on Auridon, aside from the fact that the sky is shrouded in a thick haze that casts a violet hue upon everything in the distance. Sheogorath’s chamberlain (Haskill I think his name was?) is standing before us when we arrive.

“I hope you haven’t been waiting here the whole time,” I say.

“No, although I was starting to wonder if you were going to show up again at all,” Haskill says.

“Sorry, I had to deal with some issues involving a couple of far more boring Daedric Princes attempting to make a mess of Nirn. You know how it goes.”

“Some of them do enjoy their pointless invasions,” Haskill says. “It’s positively tiresome, really. Now, you are here to retrieve a book for that Shalidor person, yes?”

“I am, indeed, still the only library courier who the Mages Guild could find who was crazy enough to go to the Shivering Isles for them, yes,” I say. “What will I be playing today?”

Haskill dryly informs me that I will be retrieving a fork and a staff, and a portal will take me to the fork. Which Sheogorath ‘misplaced’ in Skyrim a very long time ago, apparently. This claim is probably nonsense, of course.

“So, wait, is this portal going to take us to Tamriel now or then?” I wonder.

Haskill sighs and replies as if explaining to a particularly dull child, “The portal will not transport you through time. The fork has simply been there for a very long time. This would be a much more lively trip for you otherwise. Since then you would be dealing with living dragon priests and not dead ones.”

“I’m sure death has not improved their temperament,” I say, heading for the portal.

Shalidor and I come out in a frozen tomb, the floor covered in hard-packed snow and icicles longer than I am tall hanging from the ceiling.

I shiver. “Brrr. And here I am, dressed for the balmy south.”

“Be on your guard,” Shalidor says. “There are likely to be draugr here.”

“And traps?” I ask.

“Very likely,” Shalidor says. “My ancestors certainly loved their traps.”

We head in, and the longer we go without springing any traps or being attacked by draugr, the warier we become. One door is blocked by a barrier of ice, preventing us from going forward. When we inspect the treasures in the area we can get to, we’re ambushed by draugr, but we were so wary by that point it’s not like it was even a surprise. The dragon priest in question (I already forgot his name) taunts us and tells us to come face him, and the ice barrier drops.

“Happy to oblige,” I say.

The thing that bothers me most about this tomb isn’t the door that was obviously blocked by an ice barrier, but the other doors that we simply have no way of opening. It almost feels like Sheogorath has figuratively put us on a mine cart to keep us on the rails and not wander off. I’m still thoroughly looting everything I run across that looks even slightly valuable and will fit in my inventory.

“It does feel like that, doesn’t it,” Shalidor says when I comment on it. “It would not surprise me if the Madgod were still messing with us.”

We find the dragon priest in question (it has to be him) hovering two feet above the ground in a shaft of light. I wonder if the tomb was intentionally built like that, or if he blasted a hole in his own ceiling just for that effect. In any case, he’s been taunting us in what I think is supposed to be the dragon language but his accent is absolutely horrible. The Nord Tongues I fought back in the day would have mocked this guy senseless if they heard it, if they weren’t too busy pretending to be respectful of him. And then they’d mock him over drinks when they think he can’t hear.

In any case, we beat him up and take the fork, and Haskill shows up to send us to Hammerfell to locate the next trinket Sheogorath wants us to retrieve for his little game.

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Another tomb, this one considerably warmer. Shalidor instructs me to collect essences and imbue seals on statues, something about crystals or whatever, which aside from the arcane terminology basically just amounts to catching little glowy bits floating in the air while running around hitting dead things. A lot less complicated than he makes it sound. Like collecting butterflies without a net, just by capturing them into orbit around me.

A gravely voice echoes over the valley, taunting us. Really, why do they always insist on taunting? “You’ll never best my generals!” says the voice of dead prince whoever. Why don’t they ever say things like ‘hey, how are you, welcome to my tomb, would you like a drink, let me tell you about some very fascinating things in my life!’ It’s just rude, let me tell you. If I were spending enough of my afterlife stuck in a tomb aware enough to yell at anyone who shows up, I’d be glad for somebody new to talk to.

I look over to Shalidor and notice the purple motes flitting around him have turned into a veritable torrent of purple motes. “Shalidor, are you quite alright? You’re looking more purple than usual.”

“I’m fine, this is perfectly normal,” Shalidor says, then points me toward going to beat up the dead prince’s dead generals, which I cheerfully oblige.

The bigger and glowier essences of the generals (which Shalidor has to remind me to stop playing with and get on with it) activate the other two statues so that we can make the big glowy orb in the middle make a glowy line that opens up the tomb. I am entirely completely confused as to why any of this was constructed. It seems like a bit of a cumbersome way to open a door, and if he really wanted to just keep people out, he wouldn’t need a door at all. Although not so confused as to refrain from looting it on the way through. (I wish I could fit this entire bookcase in here. It’s very pretty and fancy. Maybe if I emptied out some of the junk I don’t need… Shalidor is complaining at me, fine, I’ll get on with it.)

“You’ll never have the staff!” exclaims dead prince what’s-his-name.

“Why do you even want it so badly?” I wonder aloud. “Isn’t it an artifact of Sheogorath? Or at least one he apparently likes enough to send us after.”

After beating up the dead prince, I continue my looting of the tomb, barely remembering to pick up the staff we came here to get in the first place. There’s a lute, a harp, and some sort of stringed object that might be an instrument I don’t quite recognize. I opt not to put a lit candelabra into my pack.

“Are you quite done looting yet?” Shalidor asks.

“Yeah, can’t fit anything else,” I say, stuffing a fancy pillow into the last bit of space. “Let’s go.”

Outside, Haskill’s got another portal for us to return to the Shivering Isles, which would definitely beat trying to figure out where exactly in Hammerfell I am in order to climb out of here and locate civilization.

Sheogorath is there when we arrive, along with a glowing purple book fluttering around like a butterfly at his side. The Madgod fondly greets the fork, and me as an afterthought. I return the fork to him, and he hugs it and practically fondles it in a way that’s almost embarrassing to watch. (How much of this is just him being weird, and how much is him deliberately trying to make Shalidor and/or Haskill uncomfortable?)

The staff, it turns out, is the Wabbajack itself. Even I have heard of this one. Sheogorath tells me to take it and go zap some of the robed people standing around in this weird fake temple of the Divines sort of place. I’d really just taken them as part of the scenery and I’m still pretty sure they’re not even real anyway. (Although if they’re real, they should be used to weirdness in the Shivering Isles by now.)

I run around waving the Wabbajack around, giggling gleefully as I turn people into statues, pigs, cats, pumpkins, and cheese. Sheogorath seems pleased enough, and takes the staff back and gives me leave to take the book. I pull out my butterfly net and capture it, and as I do so, the Shivering Isles vanishes in a flash of light and the Elden Root Guildhall reappears.

“No cheese this time?” Valaste asks with a faint grin as she takes the book out of the butterfly net.

“No, Sheogorath had me turn people into cheese,” I say. “I’m not sure if they were actual people or just illusions but it still would have felt weird eating it after that.”

Valaste suppresses a giggle. “Yes, I understand that might be awkward. Good work. I’ll get started on this right away. The Circus of Cheerful Slaughter is it? Quite the upbeat title, that!”

I go off to meet up with my friends and sort through my bounty, to see what to sell and what to keep. And where to put what to keep. Being able to use a wayshrine to teleport isn’t going to be especially useful until I can do it without winding up naked at my destination. My friends rented one of the upper pods of the Outside Inn, and are in the midst of chatting, eating, and/or reading when I come in.

“I see you’ve arrived safely back from your mad venture,” Merry says, sliding a bookmark into his book and setting it aside.

“How did it go?” Gelur asks. “I’ve never been to Oblivion.”

“Things went pretty well,” I say, setting my pack on the floor and opening it up. “The Madgod only asked me to solve some stupid puzzles and turn some people into cheese. You know how it goes.”

“Back up a moment here,” Eran says. “You turned people into cheese?”

“To be fair, I’m not sure they were actually people,” I say. “They were mostly just standing around and weren’t very responsive, so either they were illusions or their minds were already pretty much gone. And really, when you’re in the Shivering Isles with no portal out and the Madgod tells you to turn people into cheese, you turn people into cheese, or he’ll start thinking you’re boring and do annoying things to you.”

“You were the one who chose to go to the Shivering Isles in the first place,” Merry points out.

“Shalidor’s very persuasive,” I say, pulling items out of my pack. “Or annoying. He kept complaining about me stopping to load up my pack.”

Eran stares at the growing pile emerging from the expanded space inside-but-not-inside the pack. “Did you rob a tomb?”

“I, in fact, robbed two tombs,” I say. “The Madgod also had me swipe ‘Forky’ and the Wabbajack. Sadly, he took them back. That could have been fun.”

“Wait, the Shalidor?” Merry asks.

I smirk. “Yes, the Shalidor.” I wave vaguely toward the big tree. “He’s probably still loitering up at the Mages Guild if you’d rather go chat with him about history than me. He probably remembers more of history than me. And is saner.”

“Yes, sorry, just confirming,” Merry says. “I never expected to be bumping into quite so many famous historical figures in such a short period of time.”

“You should have come with me to the Mages Guild, then,” I say. “I got to make the acquaintance of, and repeatedly hit, a long-dead dragon priest and some Redguard or Yokudan or something prince. I don’t remember their names but apparently they were pretty famous at some point!”

“And then you robbed their tombs?” Ilara asks, absently pawing through the items I’ve laid out on the floor. She holds up an extremely dusty pillow and sneezes.

“In hindsight, maybe the ancient pillow wasn’t such a great idea,” I say, coughing. “Oh, hey, Ilara, did you actually want to play an instrument or was the Bard’s College just a blind excuse? I found a lute, a harp, and a… whatever this is.” I hold up the board with strings.

Ilara puts a paw on the harp curiously. “Ilara is interested in music, although she is surprised you remembered…” She plucks at the harp strings experimentally. “By Jode, this is very old… and extremely out of tune. It would probably need its strings replaced.” She moves back, covering a giggle with a paw. “Perhaps it would be better to simply sell them to a museum and use the money to buy a new one, or at least a used one that is less than a century old. Ilara is afraid to even touch the lute.”