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The results are in! Find out who won our first Tales of the Dead contest.
We asked you to show off your creative writing skills and come up with the best fictional description of an unfortunate scene in Tamriel, and you happily obliged. There were over 300 entries for this first Tales of the Dead contest! We enjoyed reading all the entertaining stories you came up with—it was tough to pick our favorites, but we’ve finally narrowed it down. Check out our three winners and their entries:
Untitled
By SomeElf
“Now, this one is among my very favourites.” The Sapiarch of Composition halted, and the gaggle of students following him slowed their pace, arranging themselves in a vague semi-circle. “It is a little political, but hardly suffers for it. Quite the contrary.”
It was the largest of many installations exhibited that day in the inner courtyard of the Shimmerene Academy. The manicured lawns and mosaic pathways that filled the heart of that prestigious institution of Altmeri learning were entirely overrun by works of avant-garde sculpture. Though it was intended for the benefit of all, none were keener to take advantage of the exhibition than the Academy’s own students of art.
Their instructor stood silent for a long moment with his hands folded behind his back, allowing the younger mer to move about the giant tableau. It was very elaborate: real earth brought to Summerset from continental Tamriel, magically-grown vegetation and, although actually made from canvas stretched on metal frames, very convincing boulders and cliffs.
“Now,” came the inevitable question, “what do we see?”
“Feasting skeletons under attack,” one of the females in the group, a willowy, black-lipped gamine, answered immediately. “Clearly human. In Tamriel.”
“What humans?” The Sapiarch of Composition rocked back on his heels, and his gaze leapt from face to face when no reply emerged. He was an embodiment of his subject, from the precise length of his robe’s hem, through the stylish knot of his sash, to the intricate braiding of his hair. His smile was taut, and cold as winter. “What is the symbol on the bag?”
“A Breton trillium,” ventured a young male, staring at the lumpy container.
“Triskelion,” corrected the Sapiarch, “but Breton is a safe wager. What else do we see? Go on, you may step closer in.”
“They had obviously been sharing a meal moments before the assault,” remarked another female as she bent over the table, careful not to disturb the objects. “The candles make that point. Why skeletons and not bodies?”
“Reasons practical and allegorical, my dear,” replied the instructor imperiously. “Corpses decay unpleasantly. More importantly, it shows their deaths were already certain, even as they ate. What is the intent of the cheese?”
The student wrinkled her long, golden nose. “Symbolising madness?”
“Precisely. Skeletons, merish arrows, cheese. Death preordained by the madness of opposing the Dominion.” The Sapiarch was in full flow. “What are arrows? Distance. Death from afar, death from the Isles, death without sullying our own hands. The scene has the appearance of chaos, but it was staged with great care using telekinesis and the help of a master archer. The feigning of chaos through ordered technique adds another semiotic layer to…”
“Is it right, though?” the black-lipped student interrupted. The other Altmer all looked away so as not to be seen to abet the insolence. Yet she forged on. “To just use their bones like that, for art?”
The Sapiarch of Composition regarded her with pity. “I am afraid you will loathe the next one, then.”
Bad Monday
By Michael Marks
It was a Monday, starting out like any other day with me standing in the middle of a crime scene, looking down at a dead body. I had a splitting headache and a desperate need for coffee.
The name's Thorsson, Lars Thorsson. I'm a city guard... well, I used to be anyway; then I took an arrow to the knee. But that's another story. Now I'm hired muscle. A fixer.
I shook my head, fuzzy on the details. Skooma, something to do with bad cats hustling bad sugar. I rubbed my left temple, wincing at the pain that throbbed like a spike in my skull. I'da killed for some Bugloss just now but there was nothing more than scrub grass in sight. I scowled. Focus on the details...
The campsite was a dead drop. The guys cooking sugar likely worked a lab in some cave nearby; no way they'd risk a buy there. This was one of a hundred little spots where you could make a discreet swap. Traces of gooey sugar clung to the splintered wood barrel. The buyer picks up the goods and leaves the gold. You didn't have to be a detective to know the emblem on the green silk bag was the seal of Rethan Holdings, Riften's biggest bank and money launderer for the rich and infamous.
But something had gone wrong. My eyes narrowed. Dead Guy #1 was on his back. Somebody had punched his ticket but good, an arrow in each eye socket. Nifty shooting; I know, I'm decent with a bow myself. This was Dark Brotherhood maybe, those shadowy little ninja-types gave me the creeps. One moment you're alone, then some whisp of smoke thumps an arrow in your melon.
Dead Guy #2 got it quick; so quick he never had a chance to get out of his chair. Something seemed familiar about the body but I couldn't place it. Just bones now; muscle, skin and clothes rotted away. But the pose was casual, cocky, almost like he'd been looking at Grom lying dead...
My eyes flicked to the corpse on the ground. How'd I know his name was Grom? Jumbled pictures flashed through my mind. Grom's face when he turned and saw me staring at him down the length of an arrow. I grinned when I shot him, shot my partner. Screw Grom and the Khajits, I'd thought, I had the skooma and the gold. I remembered sitting down to savor the moment, sitting right...
My eyes drifted to the second corpse and the pain in my skull throbbed anew. I sat right there.
Panic crawled up my gut as I remembered the vaguely feline shadow off to my left, just as something slammed into my skull. The damn cats had a fixer of their own. I raised my hand, dawn's light sifting through transparent fingers.
It was a Monday, just like every other day for the last twenty-odd years, when I realize the body I'm looking down on is my own.
Untitled
By Maddrax
The shadows in front of the rocks grew longer, and as the sun set on the horizon the bones in the glade started to move. Esher, a skeleton leaning on a huge stone, yawned and scratched himself where his ear used to be—now replaced by an arrow. It’d been almost five years since that arrow took his life, but there was still that horrible itching, dawn after dawn.
“I can’t believe it,” slipped from his mouth.
Uther, his companion from days of old (and obviously beyond death as well), asked in his screeching voice, “Huh? What’s going on?” Since Esher didn’t answer, he asked again, this time louder. “WHAT’S GOING ON?”
“You won’t believe it,” Esher babbled, standing up.
“GO ON AND TELL ME WHAT YOU SEE!” Uther demanded impatiently. He knew Esher had problems understanding everything with only one “good” ear, but Esher, on the other hand, often forgot about Uther’s inability to see anything on account of the two arrows that replaced his eyeballs. It had annoyed him since the fateful day both died in a rain of arrows. “WHAT DO YOU SEE?” he asked once more.
Esher gazed at the table where both of them sat when they were killed. Yesterday, the table was empty and abandoned, but today….
“How brave someone must be. There’s been someone eating here!” Esher marveled.
“Eating?” No answer. If Uther still had his eyes, he would have rolled them. Instead he sighed and asked a bit louder, “EATING?”
“Well, just a picnic. Obviously someone climbed over us and had a picnic here!” Esher explained.
“I don’t want to pretend to be scarier than we are, but that shows real guts,” Uther noted, standing.
The skeleton with the arrow in his ear didn’t reply. Instead he grabbed a piece of cheese, took a bite, and snatched up the bottle of wine lying next to a plate of fruit. Chewing, he noted something. “I believe *nom* they were *nom* disturbed. There’s still so much untouched. *gulp*” A piece of chewed-up cheese fell to the ground.
Uther fumbled toward the table as he realized that Esher had set to work on the food. His head suddenly turned into Esher’s direction, the arrows in his face tipping the bottle off the table. “WHAT’S THAT YOU’RE EATING WITHOUT ME?” his angry voice questioned, followed by a clink and rippling wine pouring onto the ground.
Esher sighed: “Cheese. It would have tasted very good with some wine. How about some grapes?” He plucked off a bunch and threw it at Uther. Coincidentally, he caught them with one of the arrows, so the deep purple fruits looked almost like some kind of eye patch. Esher just had to chuckle. “WHAT?” Uther demanded.
But Esher didn’t answer, since the scene had changed suddenly. The last thing Uther heard was one amazed and furious assertion. “I can’t believe it! There are two skeletons having our dinner!” The very last thing Esher saw was a huge fireball.
Congratulations! We hope you had fun. All of our winners will receive a $25 gift certificate to the Bethesda Store and an ESO t-shirt of their choice.
Even if you didn’t win this time, keep those writing skills sharpened up; we’ll have another Tales of the Dead contest in the future. Until then, always be on your guard during your adventures in Tamriel—you wouldn’t want to end up like the poor souls in the screenshots!
