The receding river, pushed far below its normal levels by sustained and terrible drought, had exposed banks that hadn’t been seen in a time immemorial. Among the finding’s Professor Jacobs and his team had made was a round block so long fossilized that they had, at first, assumed it a common stone. However, when it was taken back to the lab with the rest of the excavation’s haul, the professor had discovered it a mummified turtle. It had been buried in the side of the river post-mortem after a series of hieroglyphs had been carved into its shell.
Fascinated by whatever ritual had required such an odd protocol, he set about deciphering the glyphs immediately. Assuming that it was a sacrifice to some unknown river god or a ghastly part of some spring ritual, he instead found an ominous dictum. Into the shell of this ancient tortoise was graven pictographs that translated thusly:
“When the river becomes this low – weep.”
See the author’s published work here.
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