The Old Ceremony

By strangers’ coasts and waters, many days at sea,
I come here for the rites of your unworlding,
Bringing for you, the dead, these last gifts of the living
And my words—vain sounds for the man of dust.
Alas, my brother,
You have been taken from me. You have been taken from me,
By cold chance turned a shadow, and my pain.
Here are the foods of the old ceremony, appointed
Long ago for the starvelings under the earth:
Take them: your brother’s tears have made them wet: and take
Into eternity my hail and my farewell.

Catullus
Image: karatastamer @ DeviantArt

A New Elder Scrolls Fic: Last Days of the Third Era

Last Days of the Third Era is a collection of articles from the Black Horse Courier, following the events and reactions after the assassination of Emperor Uriel Septim VII. I started this in 2009, and like so many TES projects, I never finished it. The material I have covers the first two weeks after the assassination, and stops more or less just before the attack on Kvatch. I’d like nothing more than to promise I’ll finish it, but I likely won’t – unless the act of posting it here somehow magically transfers me to the state of mind I’d been in while writing it. Here’s to hoping!