when it crashed i was doing a job for the thieve's guild in Paverhill, it failed to load images constantly, the saves showed when i saved but were gone after i restarted, i even a different save in slot 2 which was gone entirely, I'm on windows, I think it's on a write-protected folder, but it's not on a USB stick
If you get errors for missing image, you probably used the "update files" but skipped versions. The update files contain all files that were changed from the last to the newest version. If you missed more updates, they won't have everything you need.
Download the full game again, and move the entire content of the save folder from the old game version, to the new download of the full game.
On a write-protected folder, the system forbids the game from creating save files. In that case, you need to move the location of the game folder somewhere else, or change the permissions.