#gilith

[tauman942]

Gilith

Gilith - Cold Open Stories

Warhammer 40,000 Fast Fiction: Tragic, harrowing, and bittersweet tales in our writing contest. 1,000 words, 1 theme, 1 winner.

My story, Gilith was one of the Editor's Picks, for this month's Fast Fiction contest.

[tauman942]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Summary Sister Gilith of the Adepta Sororitas has long been held captive by the Drukhari of Commorragh, but now she has a chance to escape. However, the dreaded Lady Aestra, Archon of the Obsidian Rose Kabal, will not let her go so easily.

Originally submitted as a Fast Fiction entry to Cold Open Stories, and was published by CoS under the same title, however this cause some controversy. Read at your own risk!

Excerpt

The wych blade drips with Drukhari blood, making wine coloured splotches on the marble floor. The Incubi bodyguard seizes me by the throat, but the paralysis has already set in. Dropping to the floor, the Incubi convulses as his flesh liquefies, and his blood boils. The expanding gases pop and sizzles, as they burst from his emerald and ebony armour, and the ichor that was once his flesh, spurts out across the floor.

'What was my name before they brought me to Commorragh?'

[elistariel]

The Feast of Starlight

Mereth-en-gilith needs to be an actual holiday.

I have no idea how you'd celebrate it, other than with a feast. Nor do I know when it would be, other than before the end of autumn. 

(Northern Hemisphere) December 21 (Yule) actually works as it has the shortest amount of daylight and thus the longest night. You can still decorate with those white Christmas lights (or fairy lights in some parts of the world) without your neighbors thinking you've lost your marbles.

Although as Yule is the first day of winter, and as best I could tell in the movie, it was slightly before the last days of autumn, it would actually be a bit sooner than this. Plus BotFA took place in October (according to the Encyclopedia of Arda).  It also states they arrived at Long Lake on September 22nd.  Sooo... if the movie is going with the same time frame it would have had been sometime before that. How long were they in Mirkwood? I'd say it's either on September 21st or September 22nd.

Wait.

Isn't Bilbo's birthday September 22nd?  So, Bilbo's Birthday is the day after or the day of Mereth-en-gilith?

Also that's around the time of the autumnal equinox, or Mabon.

So, who's up for a Mereth-en-gilith/Hobbit Day/ Mabon extravaganza this coming September? (And all Septembers henceforth?)