Whiterun at night was calm and subdued, its broad streets lit by steady torchlight and the soft glow from a handful of windows.
The marketplace stood empty, stalls shuttered, while guards moved through the city at an unhurried pace, their footsteps echoing against the stone, unaware of anything beyond the gentle order of the night.
No wind stirred the plains. No insects sang in the tall tundra grass. Even the moons seemed dimmer, Masser and Secunda[1] cloaked behind drifting ash-colored clouds.
The city's great walls loomed like a sleeping giant, torches burning steadily along the parapets as guards paced their familiar routes.
Nothing seemed wrong.
That was what made it perfect.
Far beyond the western watchtower, shapes moved through the tall grass.
They did not bark, howl, growl.
They did not speak either.
They advanced with the practiced stride of predators that knew their prey could not escape.
The first werepire lifted its head and tasted the air.
Blood and... was that fear? It was faint but it was present.
It grinned, lips peeling back too far, jaw cracking softly as fangs slid into place.
Behind it, others shifted restlessly, their muscles coiling beneath skin etched with ritual scars that glowed faintly crimson.
A more calm and composed presence moved among them.
Mistress Althene stepped forward, her boots never touching the earth as she drifted inches above the grass.
Her pale form was tall and slender, silver-black hair falling smoothly over her shoulders, and her eyes glimmered with a slow, enticing confidence of a woman who knew her charms were lethal.
She was draped in a cloak of dark velvet weirdly, did not stir, seemingly blessed by the gods of divine starch
She swept her ancient and calculating eyes across the pack.
"Remember," she said softly, her voice carrying without effort. "This is not slaughter."
One of the hybrids snorted, its breath steaming.
She turned her gaze on it and sneered softly.
"Disobedience," Althene continued, "will be corrected.
"The creature lowered its head.
Satisfied, she raised one pale hand.
"Begin."
The first scream came from the western farms.
A man was lifted bodily from his porch, fingers scrabbling uselessly at the air before something slammed him into the dirt hard enough to snap his spine. His blood sprayed across the tundra grass, still steaming when a shadow passed over it.
By the time the farm bell rang, it was already too late.
Guards shouted from the watchtower as shapes burst from the darkness—too fast, too large, moving on all fours one moment and upright the next.
"Vampires!!!"
Arrows flew, striking flesh and bouncing off reinforced bone.
One guard barely had time to scream before claws punched through his chest.
The alarm bells of Whiterun began to ring. The bells were only used when the threat was beyond the ability of mere guards.
Its deep and thunderous tolls woke the city in a panic.
Inside the walls, the Companions felt it immediately.
Aela the Huntress sat upright in her bed, heart hammering, nostrils flaring.
"Blood," she whispered.
Across the hall, Skjor's eyes snapped open.
"That's not normal," he growled, already reaching for his armor.
Kodlak Whitemane emerged from his quarters moments later, staff in hand, his aged eyes sharp. The bells echoed through Jorrvaskr, joined now by distant screams carried by the wind.
"Something comes," Kodlak said. "And it is not prey."
They were halfway out the mead hall when the first explosion hit the gates.
Whiterun's main gate shattered inward under impossible force, the iron screaming as it tore from its hinges. A werepire barreled through the breach, smashing into guards like a living battering ram. Its eyes burned gold and red simultaneously, saliva dripping from its jaws as it roared with hunger and fury.
Behind it came vampires, disciplined killers clad in dark armor, moving with coordinated precision.
They flowed into the city like spilled ink, blades flashing, throwing blood orbs in crackling arcs of crimson light.
Mistress Althene entered last.
She stepped through the smoke and fire as though walking into a ballroom, hands folded behind her back, looking like she came for a dance. Her eyes flicked from rooftop to street, assessing the whole situation.
"Impressive response time," she murmured as guards rallied.
Then she gestured.
The werepires leapt into action at the beckon of their mistress.
One scaled a building in seconds, claws biting into wood and stone before launching itself onto the battlements. Another crashed through a shopfront, dragging a screaming woman back into the street before a vampire slit her throat with clinical efficiency.
The city became chaos. Fire spread as steel rang.
Blood soaked the cobblestones and panic rattled the guards until—
"The companions are here!"
Nobody knew who said that, but the relief it brought was palpable.
Companions poured into the streets, some armored, some bare-chested, all furious.
The immediately got to work, showing why they were one of the most revered forces in all of Skyrim.
A shield-brother met a werepire, parrying its claw with his shield before kicking it into another shield-brother who stabbed his silver sword into the, neck of the creature with brutal efficiency.
But where the creature should had gone limp, it snapped its head toward the warrior, grinning devilishly. The next second, it pulled out the sword, the wound closing at an alarmingly fast pace.
The werepire flexed its neck before it lunged towards the man.
"Ahhhhhh—
A blood curdling scream rang out...
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[1]: Masser (or Jode) and Secunda (or Jone) are the two, smaller, twin moons orbiting the planet Nirn in The Elder Scrolls universe.