Eulogy for St. Katran

That was the first time I'd ever cried for any movie, book, or game, when I was going up the elevator to find Catherine. I'd figured out, the moment I read her journal, that the missing island must be the remains of the Great Tree she loved so much, and I had this gutwrenching feeling that Gehn's sadistic sense of humor, so visible all over the island, meant he'd imprisoned her in whatever was left of the tree. I'm sure many of you guessed the same. Even expecting it, I was so angry to see my fears realized. It had become more to me than a game, and then these characters took on a life as real as that of Frodo and Bilbo, Han and Leia, Aslan and Aravis.

Thus I became a disciple of St. Katran, and I humbly submit the moment of my conversion

Catherine
Stands alone
Upon a balcony of bone
Overlooking a breathing sea
That echoes sighs she never speaks.
She turns, walks back inside
To pace her narrow prison:
Hollowed heart
of the World Tree
Cut to the knees
Its leaves and sacred boughs
Towered trunk long since taken
Grist for Gehn's empty books.
What does she see
In her blood red robe
Stripped of her people's mask
Wife of a dead man
Child of a dying world
Guardian of a dream
Goddess to a riven people?
-- Truth written stark
on unseen pages
Broken stones
Fallen trees
Islands drowning
Sundered from sea to sky.
Will she be the last
Living soul of a dying Age
Cast adrift on her
Tiny shipwreck
Divested of words,
Her worlds?
No.
She waits
Who understands too well
For this humble traveller
Who understands nothing
Who walks alone, like her
To find and set her free.