Whoa.
What are you waiting for, explorer? Let’s go explore!
This place looks so old! How are the lamps still lit? The pipes are still hot, too.
The automata built by the Dwemer work to maintain the place, running on ­­
What is that!?
Elven ears… pale skin suggesting lack of sunlight… sophisticated chitinous armor...
It’s a… a Falmer. It has to be.
A Falmer? I thought the Nords killed them all?
You said so yourself.
After the razing of Saarthal, they tried. Winterhold was built on the backs of Falmer
slaves, and any elf that the Nords couldn’t use they hunted down and killed. Yet some
small communities remained, isolated in the mountains or in hidden sanctuaries, safe for
the time being. Others took refuge with the Dwemer, though that did not save them. This
one must have been one of those.
How could an elf turn into this… thing?
I don’t know, but... what else could he be?
My friend, Ursa Uthrax, presents the most compelling theory. According to her, the Dwemer
fed the Falmer a fungus that blinded them, making them dependent on their new masters
instead of providing the sanctuary they were promised. The Falmer rebelled of course, and
for hundreds of years the two races were at war, until one day the
Dwemer simply... vanished.
Everyone had thought that the Falmer were gone for good. But recently I’ve been hearing
more and more rumors of strange pale goblins appearing out of nowhere from beneath the
earth. People had forgotten about them, convinced themselves that they were all dead. Something
tells me everyone will soon remember.
Eating bad mushrooms made them look like this? Are you sure it wasn’t angering a Daedra
or messing with the Earth Bones or something?
There’s nothing to be sure about, lass. The Nords didn't write much about their enemy,
and the Dwemer and Falmer are long gone.
The stele kept by Calcelmo seems to corroborate Ursa’s findings though. It is written in
both Dwemeri and Falmeri, and appears to be a compact between the two races, promising
protection in return for servitude. The Dwemer set themselves up as the saviours of the Falmeri
people, claiming to be their only path to survival, billing blindness as a small price
to pay for continued existence. I do not know if the rest of their transformation stems
from the toxin, from living underground, or from some other darker forces…
When we reach Winterhold I’ll get you a copy of Calcelmo’s translation of the Diary
of Faire Agarwen, one of the last Falmer to document their struggle following the death
of their leader, the Snow Prince. She writes beautifully of the hardships that befell the
Falmer during those years:
“I tire of the tears of women and children. My own have run dry.”
“In the night I find it difficult not to focus on times past. There are moments in
my rest when I still hear the laughter of Young Ones at play in the valley. Other times
I see the pale flicker of happy moments which were once so common in the land of the Snow
Elves. I try not to dwell on these memories too long. Often our surroundings make it impossible
to dwell on any happiness.”
That’s awful. I know Falmer killed everyone in Sarthaal, but their entire people didn’t
deserve to be hunted down like that.
Her final passage, and in my opinion, the most mournful of all, may refer to the Dwemer
and the so called salvation they promised the defeated snow elves:
“There is no reason we cannot live life with the sun and the wind against our skin.
There are those here who are friends to us and plan to help us once the threat has ended.
We know now to survive we must be born anew. Outside, we will appear as though we belong
here. Inside, we will carry our truth and our scars.”
You see this?
It’s a soul gem. It’s the reason these constructs are still running after all these
years.
You mean… those are all Falmer souls in there?
They might be. Maybe this is how Faire’s people were “born anew” ­ as twisted
slaves to the Dwemer in life, and power cells for their constructs in death.
Let’s get out of here little tongue. No sense in dwelling on that which we cannot
change.