The Five Children of Sithis and the Night Mother

(A Nerdy Blog Post -- Adapting Another Artist's Pattern or Finding Inspiration For Personal Gamer Den Decor)

Sithis and the Night Mother had five children in which she slew in his name, returning them to the Void. Sithis demands souls to be returned unto him, he demands blood, and the Night Mother speaks for Sithis.

There are five positions of importance in the Dark Brotherhood: four fingers, and a thumb. Lesser known are the nails, or the personal silencers of the Black Hand. The thumb is the leader, the Listener of the Black, and and each of the four fingers is a Speaker called to distribute the Listeners instructions amongst the other assassins, including their personal silencers, for the best and most difficult contracts.

The Listener is symbolic of the first born child of Sithis and the Night Mother, and the Listener is the only one who can hear the Night Mother’s voice. 

Raveren: First born, honored the Dread Father.

Khev: Second born, betrayed the Dread Father by revealing secrets.

Nyrov: Third born, dishonored the Dread Father by disobeying his brother.

Aixel: Fourth born, betrayed the Dread Father by stealing his brother's crown.

Lis: Fifth born, betrayed the Dread Father by killing his eldest brother.

There are five tenets for the Dark Brotherhood and they all pertain to the above story. Some exist due to violations of trust, and one stands as an unholy righteous example. After all one should honor thy Mother and thy Father. :3 (Five is a sacred number in the Dark Brotherhood.)

I’ve been trying to heal my inner child. Part of healing that inner child is learning to lean more into my nerdy tendencies which have been suppressed for a long time. (Decades...) Growing up in a cult, as well as being a neurodivergent person with add/adhd and other challenges, meant I got bullied a lot. So I hid a lot of my special interests to try and lessen the frequency of that harassment for self preservation. 

One of those special interests is fandom stuff. Video games were generally more accepted, but things like lore discussions, fanfic, fanart, or other expressions of deep enthusiasm for things not grounded in reality were things I often kept quiet about.

My biggest beef with any fandom is the hypocrisy within them. Many people that gravitate towards fandoms are usually nerdy or geeky types. Folks that would have also likely experienced ostracization and bullying themselves. So you would think that because they know what that kind of pain feels like they would have a higher sense of empathy and go out of their way to set a better example or tone and create a more kind and positive atmosphere for others. 

But unfortunately that isn’t always the case.

There can be a lot of toxicity in any fandom space and while I don’t hold kids to the same standard I hold adults. You would think adults in these spaces would be mature enough to disengage and go their own way. Unfortunately, I’ve seen some ugly harassment campaigns, doxxing, etc… Not only are those things illegal, but they often rely on victims staying quiet. Sometimes with the threat of retaliation or legal complications being weaponized against them. And It would seem a lot of people abuse power in these spaces. They rely on their popularity and carefully crafted public personas to protect them from scrutiny, similar to what other narcissists and abusers do in other unrelated spaces whether secular or spiritual. When victims speaking out can be treated as the harassment itself, it becomes another example of how broken the system can be.

I understand that not everyone will get along, and not all personality types mesh well. But at some point, you would think, especially among grown adults, you would hope they know better. 

(I want to take the time to point out that the above isn’t directed at anyone in particular. It is an observation and commentary on cultural problems.)

So Lately I have been sewing or crocheting my own patterns, releasing some of them, and generally just crafting. Sometimes it’s original work, and sometimes its inspired by patterns that other creators generously share.

I came across one pattern that inspired this project: making five skulls to represent the five children of Sithis and the Night Mother. The very same skulls you see on the sanctuary doors throughout the series and in the crypt in Oblivion. 

Pattern is by ComplicatedKnots: https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/skull-10

It’s available free for anyone who crochets and is interested in having nerdy gamer decor or gothic flair in their home. 

When crocheting this, I decided that the Listener or the first child, should be represented by ruby red yarn for the eyes, while the Speakers or the other children would be represented by a black eyes. Black and red are the colors associated with the Dark Brotherhood. 

I used white yarn for the skull, but you could also use an off-white or cream because technically bone often has a yellow or grey cast depending on age and health.

What I liked about this pattern is how fast they work up. It’s easy to make them in batches. I prepped all of my eye backings ahead of time, and each section of the fiber artist’s youtube tutorial was easy to follow. 

I only had one issue and that I think was mostly due to how late it was at night. I was tired. I mistook certain row decreases for the sc3tog they were regular decreases.

Haha! Tired brain!!! 

(Well technically two, because I bought curved needles and didn’t realize until the next morning they were defective. Ugh… Cracked eyes with burrs snagging and tearing yarn. I thought it was my yarn or sewing technique at first. It would seem everything has dropped in quality massively in the last year especially.) 

I myself am new to amigurumi and have been wanting to do it for a while. Before I did this project, I have been quietly experimenting with my own patterns while learning new techniques. Stuff like tightening stitches for stuffing, etc… I thought about making my own skull pattern but have been too exhausted working on a multitude of felt sewing patterns and crochet patterns while balancing my personal life load.

I have one amigurumi pattern currently in progress right now, but it's on pause while I troubleshoot some textures and shape ideas in my head. So this was a good project to do in the meantime.

After I built the eyes I started on the first child, Raveren, obviously. Because you can’t call your Speakers before you have a Listener. It makes more logical sense that the first Listener of the guild would have been called first or born first in this case. Lol

You could probably make keychains, Halloween decor, Gothic decor, game decor or I could even see these as spooky Halloween-Christmas ornaments, these kinds of patterns I feel are pretty adaptable.

So here’s a few pictures of my finished amigurumi skulls. I’m not going to do a full breakdown, blow by blow of another artist's pattern. If you want to make one or a few for yourself, please feel free to check them out via the link previously shared. 

May the Night Mother guide your stitches that they be tight and your contracts successful. Hail Sithis! :3