As the Long Wake draws to its central nights, the processions to the Necropolis cease, the paeans to the dead fall silent, and the unutterable quietude of the tomb falls over the Dual-City. The Stillest Night when even the tomb-watchers and the professional mourning-societies refuse to warble the death-songs of the ancients; a memory of ancient wars between Man and Kzin, when the poet Nguen hla Rii stood watch over his master, heroically dead, outside the walls of ancient Tsurr, silently composing his warrior-master's death-song while evading the peltasts and others of the enemy, to sing the elegaic-epic as the dawn came and the warriors of Man retook the field against their transgressors ...
After this night, the keening of the women and paeans of the mourners will resume. But for the moment, the city halts; even foreigners respect its holiness; and all business ceases ... No new projects may begin this week, this week of Stillest Night, while projects already begun come to whatever fruition may have started beforehand ...
(i.e. no downtime actually happens last week, week-ending 12/26; I'll catch up with week-ending 12/19 soon--it involved a fair amount of writing--and thereafter I'll collect downtimes for week-ending 1/2 and try to be more timely)
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