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Prophecies of Hevel - by CrawDave » August, 14 2021
The prophecies of Hevel, a High-Priest of Meklah in the year after the Catastrophe of Meluah. The writings were promulgated as a series of postings and letters to the various members of the Church of Meklah. The prophecies were collected and edited together by an unknown redactor known to scholars only as ‘R’.
The Condemnation of the Faithful1
Look on high and call to me;
Read these words and understand:2
We have been as celebrants of a great feast,
Gorging ourselves on the meat of great beasts,
Drinking down our wine and reveling with no remorse:
And look what we have gained!
Now we retch and vomit and wonder why.
We cry out as the meat turns sour in our stomach,
And our innards stretch and contract
While the wine does its work, we lose the meal entirely.
We have gorged ourselves on knowledge!
We have eaten from the trees and fields and bushes
And now there is no more. We are barren,
Grey-haired counselors are slain, great cities burnt to ash;
The harrowed run from fires wearing nothing but ashes,
And the shadows themselves hound them and cut at their flesh.
Look on high and call to me;
Read these words and understand:
Adanum is a great clay urn overfilled with boiling water.
We pour more and more, tending fires and laboring.
But now the urn has cracked, and the heat is at our feet.
Cry, you faithful of Meklah! Prostrate yourselves,
Throw yourselves to a shadowed corner
And beg forgiveness from the God of Hidden Angles3
For the earth of Adanum is cracked and bleeding,
Its boiling water will scourge our flesh.
A great Secret was released by Deception,
And the whole of Imarel was a slave to its inequities.
Now you fear the great calamity that befell Meluah,
But you claim to love your God, Meklah,
Who knows of things greater than even Deception herself,
Whose retribution shook the world and lit the dark.4
Look on high and call to me;
Read these words and understand:
You are an orphan in the street, a whelp scourged by whips,
Your father beat you and your mother abandoned you,
And so without guidance, you have turned to sin.
Your true father harkens you!
The shadows you knew before everything call you!
A benefactor gives you shelter, food, fine clothing,
But you fall to your knees and weep in terror. Why?
You know your unworthiness, and so weep bitterly.
Now a great secret is returned, but yet you weep.
Your only benefactor is Meklah,5
Is to you a switch, and you weep with child’s eyes,
Fear with child’s terror, shake on a child’s legs;
We have witnessed a great blessing, but you,
You are like a child who has been chastened by his lord.
The third section and the beginning of the central prophetic narrative of the work. After introducing the setting and providing important background for the prophet’s understanding of Meklah, now the reader can follow Hevel on his journey and understand his motives and message. ↩
These words become the refrain throughout the first piece of Hevel’s prophecies. It is the call of the prophet for others to “read these words and understand.” Considering the common vows of silence within Meklah’s church, it is no wonder they would be called to “read” and not to “listen”.↩
Apparently a reference to Meklah. Origins unknown.↩
The prophet sees a contest between Synri, Lady of Deception, and Meklah, God of Secrets, taking place by way of the Xirath. Synri had brought the Xirath into power through deception, and Meklah is credited with their destruction.↩
This is clearly a pun on “The Benefactor”, who led the Xirath during the Benefactor’s War that brought them to power. The prophet seeks to remind the faithful that Meklah is their true benefactor, and not the Xirath and their power.↩