Translation of the 'Croatoan Tablet'

[ACADEMIC ARCHIVE: Miskatonic University Special Collections] DOCUMENT: #MU-AT-017 TITLE: Translation of the 'Croatoan Tablet'

Translator's Note: The following is a provisional translation of the glyphs found on a slate tablet unearthed near the original site of the Roanoke Colony in 1937. The language bears superficial resemblance to Proto-Algonquian but contains numerous logograms of no known terrestrial origin. The translation is highly contested, but offers a chilling, if unverifiable, narrative.

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[Start of Translation]

...and the sickness is not in the belly or the lung, but in the sky. The sun is a jaundiced eye that does not blink. The stars are wrong. We watch them at night and they shift when we are not looking. They form patterns of gates we are not meant to see.

The savages do not approach. They fear this land now. They say the soil sings a sick song. We hear it too. It is a low thrumming that loosens the teeth. It promises... succor. It promises an end to hunger.

Master Dare's daughter, Virginia, does not cry. She hums the soil-song in her crib. Her eyes are the color of the bruised sky.

A hunter came from the woods. He was not of the savage tribes. His limbs were long, and they bent at angles that made the women scream. He did not walk, but flowed between the trees like smoke. He offered us a covenant. He pointed to the crooked stars and then to the sea. He did not speak with a mouth.

We have made our choice. The hunger is too great. The song is too sweet. We will not flee this place. We will go into the song. We will be the harvest. We carve this stone as a warning and an invitation.

Look for us in the word CROATOAN. It is not a place, but a key. The door is the sea. The lock is the sky.

[End of Translation]