A Scholar ' s Guide to Nymphs Content . A Scholar ' s Guide to Nymphs I grew up a scholar , an ascetic devoted to knowledge , with eyes that saw beauty in a fascinating passage in a dusty tome , love in the candle that allowed me to study on starless nights , passion in a well - reasoned argument of a long dead issue . I was a student who never graduated and was never expelled . Though I am not defending myself , I should further define myself . I am not what you would call a prude . In fact , I can speak of subjects in a detached way that would make the most debauched strumpet in Skyhawk blush with discovered modesty . I wrote an essay on the House of Dibella as a scholar should , analysing the cult of beauty and physical relations as one might study crop rotation or the digestive system of an Orc . The acquaintances of mine who were inclined to wink and giggle I tolerated , but barely . With all that said , the reader will understand that when I decided to study the language of the nymphs in order to study their character and culture , it was not a decision I made on account of prurience or lust . Scholars have historically neglected the nymph as a subject worthy of research , and this neglect I attribute to prejudice . The sages with whom I have spoken on the subject have eloquently and intelligently formed sentences which , boiled down , can be translated as : " Nymphs look like beautiful , naked women who skip along tra - la - la and like to have indisciminate sex . What could they have to say that would be of any interest ? " So here I was faced with the most daunting of projects — to study and research a species unstudied is a potentially rewarding challenge . If the subject was unstudied because the scientific community had deemed it beneath interest , a potentially rewarding but decidedly frustrating challenge . If I spent months in serious study of their language and culture and additional time in their company , and discovered nothing more than that the common prejudice is correct , the term " laughing stock " would not do me justice . So , excited and nervous for reasons unrelated to the notoriously promiscuous behavior of my subjects , I began my studies . I mastered the language , a melodious tongue that sounds like wild elf and faerie but share no vocabulary with them . I studied the lore , and found it to be on the whole , little more than pornography and crude conjecture . I next had to find a nymph . From my centralized location in the Imperial City , I found it easy to send word around to several wellknown temples and guilds devoted to study in all the provinces . Not all replies back were serious in nature , but one , from the School of Julianos in Sentinel helped me considerably . To Magister Oitos and his disciples , I here offer my sincere gratitude . Nymphs are extremely shy creatures , no matter what the more obscene stories will tell you . No one who I ' ve spoken with has had one seek him or her out . Thus to speak with a nymph requires energy and patience . Out of courtesy for her privacy , I will not here give the location of the little grotto off the coast of Hammerfell , where I found the nymph . It took three months of patient waiting , leaving presents where I knew the nymph would be , before the nymph stood still at my approach . I remember I was carrying a bouquet of purple and white tetias , and she looked at them and then at me , and smiled . The effect of her smile was truly magical , I ' m convinced . Her body was , of course , perfect ; her face lovely and serene ; her hair like silk flame . But until she smiled , she was beautiful in the abstract , a perfect statue by a master . The smile made her approachable and , thus , terrifying . " For you , " I said , attempting my first utterance of Nymph to a real nymph . Her smile grew into a grin which became a giggle and then a laugh . The reader has doubtless heard of the silver laughter of the elves . The nymph ' s laugh is earthy and spontaneous , and very . . . suggestive . " And what do you want from me in return , mortal ? " she asked . " I am , " There is no , I should say , known word in the Nymph language for scholar , " I am a man who likes to learn things . I want to learn things about you . " And I did . Nymphs are the wisest , most wonderful creatures in Tamriel . My nymph , her name is Ayalea ( a poor phonetic transcription of a word that sounds more like a light wind blowing through a small crack in a hollow chamber ) and she knows more about the behavior and varieties of the deep woodland creatures than the greatest wood elf scholar I ever met . She taught me of flowers and ghosts and creatures too fast and timid to have ever been seen by man . Ayalea taught me how to learn for the very first time . How to open my mind to all of the possibilities of life and how to use that knowledge , not just to hold in my cramped brain like a dragon ' s horde . If you ever meet a nymph , speak to her . Editor ' s note : the writer Vondham Barres is no longer a scholar at the Imperial University . He deposited this manuscript and disappeared from the civilized world . His current whereabouts are unknown .