Chapter Text
Dearest Almvi,
This parchment is CURSED. In 5 days, you will develop corpus if you do not copy this letter and send it to 5 friends.
Yours faithfully,
Seht
─── • ─── • ───
Dearest Almsi,
The situation here on Vvardenfell is worrisome. A small blight (of the agricultural nature) has harmed saltrice yields, and I have exhausted my treasury making up the shortfall. If my ministers are to be believed, less than half of the expected annual harvest was actually reaped. This, after a series of poor years, threatens disaster.
We must not be caught in a situation where the faithful need more charity than I can provide. Though I understand the hesitations you (pl.) have about appearing to work together — about appearing to need one another’s support and not, as it may have been misconstrued by the faithful, existing each on our own merits — appearances aside, I need saltrice.
It is a simple economic question. There is significantly less arable land on Vvardenfell, and even before the Sharmat’s latest incursion, the island imported some amount of its grains from the mainland. After all, the Thirr region alone produces more than the entirety of Vvardenfell.
Please do not misunderstand when I say that the health and vitality of the whole Dunmer people rests on Vvardenfell. After all, we are part of the integral whole. Pilgrims born on Vvardenfell must make their way to the continent to visit Necrom, Almas Thirr, and Almalexia, as surely as one born there travels here to undertake the Pilgrimage of the Seven Graces.
More to the point, the Sharmat still reigns over Red Mountain. How might, I wonder, our own statuses be affected should I turn away the hungry? If large swathes of Vvardenfell should lose faith in me, how much stronger will the Sharmat grow?
For he gains. It is as you have heard, I fear, and I have yet to make any compelling inroads. The Blight, the ancient curse of Red Mountain, stalks Vvardenfell again. At my behest, the Archcanon has begun experiments and inquiries into a possible cure. That I even asked caused a stir. Saryoni, ever a faithful servant, was not upset. But others thought that we, the Tribunal, ought to be the cure, or at least have a better sense of one.
Perhaps our success held within it the key of our own demise..? For, as the faithful wait patiently for their Gods to solve the blight, they busy their hands not with magic and inquiry, but heresy and war. Smugglers have turned away from skooma entirely, preferring to work with the Sixth House to distribute their ritual objects far and wide. And as a result, common Dunmer from Balmora to Khuul are plagued by nightmares.
I am at a loss. I do not know how to stop this latest incursion. I seek your counsel.
Yours faithfully,
Vehk
P.S. There is no magic attached to the previous letter. Please do not clog our correspondence with such trifles.
─── • ─── • ───
Dearest Sivi,
(really, Vi. You should know by now that he doesn’t open these.)
I don’t have any saltrice either. No blight, but the Temple faithful of the mainland have nothing to tithe. Regular charity has drained not only Mournhold’s grainery, but Almas Thirr and Ald Iuval. Now they function more like mess halls than stores, with vagrants lining up
And why? The Empire has seized many of the saltrice fields. Ugly old men Imperials, wrinkled like babies, are granted parcels of land by the Emperor in thanks for their service to the Legion, and it doesn’t bother any of them that the land wasn’t the Emperor’s to give. Once, a Dunmer village worked there, and now, it’s nothing but a wheat field.
Don’t think I miss all the concern for your status, written as plainly in your letter as your begging. We all grow weaker every day. Poor martyred Vivec, worried about losing face!
The Blight cannot be solved by a mortal, just like a mortal cannot kill Voryn Ur. Why you would involve them is beyond me! A shortfall on rice during a famine is the least of your problems. You had might as well tell Saryoni that we are imposter gods as ask his help with curing the Blight. Cease that shit right now.
Yours,
Ayem
P.S. What do the statues look like??