(A/N) This idea's been boiling in my head ever since I saw AWE. I thought, "My goddess, there's so much potential for the history between Davy Jones and Calypso. What an incredible story to be able to tell." I've also noticed that in the Davy/Calypso fics that are popping up, not many people look at Calypso. Who is she? So yes, let's just start the ball rolling and see where this bunny ends up. The story begins with Calypso telling her own tale. Davy will eventually enter the picture with his version of events.
Forgetting How To Breathe
Chapter 1: I Am…
They say that I am a goddess. Am I? I do not know anymore. Can a goddess be held by human arms? Can the divine be snared by the depths of mortal eyes?
When I was much younger, I would have said no. Back then humans were my toys. The only thing that I understood was that they were mortal and I was deathless. I laughed at them. No matter how hard they struggled, it would all come to naught in the end. Sometimes I found myself wondering why they even bothered with the whole silly business of living if they would only come to death. I did not understand humans or what it meant to be a goddess to them. I was a child. For nigh five hundred years of men, I was a child.
But…even goddesses must grow up.
My father was an ancient sea god. I believe his most recent name was Neptune, but he had many more, as did we all. He was feared and loved by men long centuries before the followers of Christ walked the Earth. His benevolence was greatly desired and his anger was to be feared and either could be invoked with a simple twitch of the eye. Sometimes I think I received my temperament from him, and other times I am certain that it is merely a reflection of the element we embody; water, the sea, the salty, raging, free waves of the ocean. Yes, my father was once lord of all that. And I, like so many of his children, was merely a nymph in his shadow. But that never bothered me. I was content to be a sea sprite, racing the winds, stirring up storms, and toying with the fates of men brave or foolish enough to venture into my domain.
I recall one incident where I called a very brutal storm down on the heads of a few petty sailors and did not see fit to spare them or their vessel. Once the storm was over I lingered near the ship's grave. The galley herself was long gone but her dead still floated on the surface of the water. I was swimming among them in the form of a dolphin when I suddenly felt my father's presence in the water around me.
"Why did you do that?" His voice thrilled through me. I believe his name was Poseidon at the time.
"Because I wanted to," I answered timidly. I was not used to hearing this disappointed tone from him. I think I was his favorite daughter because I hadn't managed to learn the control that my mother had instilled in my other sisters. Perhaps he saw more of himself in me. But there was none of that today. Today he was disappointed in me for some reason.
"They would have died anyway. They all die! Today or twenty years from now!" I protested, growing bolder. "What difference does it make?"
"It makes a great deal of difference," he said, finally taking shape as a giant blue whale. Then he began to gather the dead sailors on his back.
"But…they are just humans!"
"Yes, and you are just a sea nymph," he said without actually looking at me.
I was speechless. Just a sea nymph? What was that supposed to mean?
"Daughter, I understand your feelings. I had to learn the same lesson a long time ago. Even now, after all of my time in this world, I find that the lesson is still not over. Being immortal, you cannot possibly understand how much men love the life they are given here."
"Again, what does it matter? They will be reborn," I said as I swam to his side.
"True," he began heavily as he swam towards the rising sun. "But one life is not the same as another. Once a life is over, it is over. That exact soul will never again exist in this world."
"Why do you care about them so much? You do the same thing all the time."
"Nay, child. It is not the same at all. Contrary to the tales men tell about me, I do not kill when it strikes my fancy to do so. I call down the rage of the ocean only when I look into sailors' hearts and find petty, odious souls that do not deserve to live. And even then, I find myself asking, who am I to judge these people?"
I was surprised by that. "Of course you have the right to judge them. You are one of the great gods they worship. These humans are like sand beneath your feet."
My father laughed bitterly at this. "Daughter, you know so little. These humans are much more powerful than you give them credit for. The only reason that I, or any of us, even exist is because the humans gave us life."
I stopped swimming when I heard that. I had never seen this side of my father before.
"What…what are you talking about?" When I heard him speak again, I looked up to see that he had raised a small island from the ocean's depths. He was beaching himself, laying the drowned sailors on the sand, out of reach of the tide.
"Humans say that we gave them life but really it is the other way around. We who are gods in this world are little more than wild magic given form through human desire. We exist as we do because mankind wanted us to be real. Haven't you always known that? Deep inside your heart of hearts? Perhaps that is why you hate humans. They appear so weak and yet you begrudge them their strength of will."
I felt rage boiling in my heart. Even if that hadn't been true before, it certainly was now. These humans couldn't possibly be stronger than me, stronger than my father. How was it possible that they could break us with a mere thought? If they were that dangerous then I was right to kill them!
"It is not that simple, daughter of mine," he said in response to the emotions he felt flowing from me. "If you were to kill all the humans then we would fade away just the same as if they forgot about us."
"But father, how is it that one who is deathless…can die?" I asked angrily. "These humans are wretched things. Giving us life and being able to take it away simply by no longer believing in us."
"Child, come to me. Look upon these people you have killed."
The request seemed strange to me at the time, but I complied nonetheless. I transformed myself into a seal and waddled up onto the beach next to my father. The scattered dead were all laid out beside my father's whale body and as I looked at them again, I noticed for the first time, that there was a small boy among them, little more than a babe.
"Oh," I gasped, feeling a small twist of guilt in my chest. I felt guilt so rarely that I almost didn't recognize it.
"I…I did not see him," I stuttered, trying to explain away my mistake.
"Did not see…or did not care?" my father asked solemnly.
"He is a child-" I started.
"You are a child, Calypso!" he thundered. "A mother somewhere will be missing her son and husband, and they will never return to her. How do you think your mother and I would feel if you were taken from us? Death follows you like a dark cloud. Whenever you bring down a ship and her crew the loneliness of death fills the water. Have you never felt it? Do you not feel it, even now?"
I did feel it. It had never been there before, but now…a gaping, aching hollowness that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere all at once. It flowed into me, was reborn, and flew out into the world once more.
"It is a terrible thing to die at sea," my father explained. "The tides cannot be snared and the waves rove the world…Charon must labor long and hard to find those lost souls in order to bring them to the other side. Perhaps this island will help him guide their souls to rest. It is the best I can do for them. Certainly there is death in the ocean, but there is also life. I do not want the loneliness and sorrow of death to plague my kingdom. I grieve for the good souls that are lost, but you…you do not seem to care about the death you cause. Think on that, Calypso."
With that, his whale body shifted into sand and he vanished into the beach. On that day, I did something that I had never done before. I took a human form. My father was right. I detested humans. Before that day, a human form was beneath me. But I was beginning to understand why he was upset with me and I thought that this might help.
However, when my two human feet finally stood firm on the sand I was overcome by a crushing sadness. It was as if someone had set a huge weight in my chest. I sank to my knees and tears flowed down my face. I curled up into a ball and sobbed. I felt miserable and undignified but I was willing to do anything to relieve the ache in my chest. Was this sadness part of being human?
I do not know how long I lay there like that. It could have been a few hours; it could have been a few years. However, in that time I began to realize things. It wasn't just my own pain that I was feeling. I was feeling the pain and sadness that I had caused other people during my already considerable existence. I felt the death pains of the hundreds of sailors my whims had killed; I felt the sorrow of their bereaved families. It was an endless web of sorrow. Now I understood why my father did not kill for pleasure. Being a deity, he had to endure his connection to the people that worshiped him. He had no choice but to acknowledge their pain. For my entire existence I had not been aware of my own connection to humans. Now that I thought about it, I had never felt anything when one of them died, not even satisfaction as I had once expected to feel. Now that my heart was open to them, I could never close it again. I had a responsibility to the humans. If I chose to kill, I would have to deal with the webs of sorrow I created. Like my father, I would have to assist Charon in his duties.
I waited on that island until Charon came. Even after he collected those lost souls, I remained. I would take different animal forms and explore the island my father had created. Sometimes I would shed land forms altogether and slip back into the sea as either animal or the sea itself and swim about the island. I am not certain how many years that went on, but however long a time it was, I did not stray far from that island. I was a docile little nymph during those years and I passed out of legend for quite some time. It would have remained that way had he not come to my island.
XxX
During the time I spent on my island the world of men began changing. Wars were fought, kingdoms were won and lost, people lived and died. One particularly bloody conflict was fought just beyond the reaches of my father's domain. I did not know very much about it because it had very little to do with the sea. The war lasted for ten years and when the victors sailed home I began to feel death on the water again. It was not long before those echoes touched my island. I felt the keening sorrow of many of my sisters as their mortal children met with death. Unfortunately I could not completely sympathize. I had never had any children, much less mortal ones that could die. I did not see the point of coupling with humans. But that would soon change.
Odysseus was a tall, dark man. He was of the Akaean race, the race of men that gave my father the name Poseidon and me the name Calypso. When I first saw him, I thought he was dead. I found him washed up on the beach. He had many wounds criss-crossing his skin and he was wearing next to nothing after the storm he'd been through. Briefly I wondered what kind of man he'd been. I could see that he was handsome far beyond the human standard, and he was obviously powerful.
"Do not turn from him," a female voice came from behind me. "He lives."
I turned and beheld a towering woman clothed in grays and blues. Stormy radiance swirled in her fierce gray eyes. I just rolled my eyes. I had never much liked the one they called Athena. She relied too much on appearance and not enough on power. She was too tame and civilized for someone like me, who lived by the law of the ocean.
"Why have you come here?" I asked spitefully. "There are no cities for you on my small island. There are no people here for you to frighten."
The goddess did not take my bait. Apparently the situation at hand was more important than another squabble.
"The man at your feet is Odysseus, king of Ithaca. He was on his way home from the shores of Troy when he incurred the wrath of your father. Poseidon would have killed him, but fate has decreed that he reach home."
I sneered at this. "Fate…or your own fancy, great goddess? It is obvious that you favor this man."
Athena glared at me. "While that is true, his survival is also the decree of the three sisters. See that he recovers and send him on his way."
"Who are you to command me, oh goddess of the land and air? Only my own father may command me. Mine or yours," I said, not quite bold enough to invoke the current name of the most powerful among us.
"Just do it, nymph!" the goddess thundered.
"Why don't you do it…oh, great one," I added as a mocking afterthought. "Or am I so far beneath you that I must cater to your every whim?"
Athena was livid, but it seemed she could not come up with a response. She vanished with a flash of lightening and a puff of smoke and I turned my attention back to the man. For a moment, I seriously considered leaving him for dead just to spite Athena. But I could not deny that I was curious about this man. What kind of person was he that the fates saw fit to spare him his end? Besides, he was not at all half bad to look at.
I built a small dwelling on my island and kept him there as he slept through his fever. I had never needed any kind of dwelling before but his fragile human body needed protection from the elements. The days passed in that way for quite some time. I bound myself to that dwelling, tending Odysseus' wounds, slowly bringing him back from the edge of night. And as the days slowly began to bleed into weeks, he began to harken to my touch. He stirred from the bed that I had made for him. He began to talk to me and we learned about each other. He was witty and always seemed to know exactly what to say.
In those early days he seemed to have little to no memory of the home he'd left behind. Certainly he remembered who he was and the fact that he was a king, and he remembered the war he'd fought very vividly, but in those first days he did not speak of his family as he would later on. That did not bother me. Because of that lack of memory Odysseus was not so lonely in those early days. He was content with my company and to listen to my stories about my own family and the long life I had lived upon the Earth. Before he came to me I did not realize just how long I had been without companionship. Nor had I realized how hungry I was for it. He filled the part of me that had been empty ever since the day my father had summoned up this island as a haven for the souls of the sailors I had murdered. I gave even that story to Odysseus, the most secret part of myself. I was afraid he would not understand what I had suffered with those revelations. In fact, I hadn't even expected him to understand, but he did. It drew me even closer to him. I had not realized it before, but I was falling in love with him. I was beginning to understand how my sisters and fellow gods could fall in love with mortals. This particular one spoke with such passion and wit about the world and all the things in it. He helped me see a new world, a different world that was far more beautiful than anything I had ever known before. His eyes and words helped me to understand the mortal perspective much better than my father ever could have. Through him I saw a world that was a hundred times more beautiful simply because it could be lost forever. A flower can bloom and then die, never to know the warmth of the sun or the sweet breath of the wind but for that one moment when it lived. Before Odysseus I had taken the world for granted, knowing that I would always live in it and be a part of it. I did not face the prospect of death the same way that he did. Odysseus made the world more real for me. In return, I gave that man everything. I gave him back his life. I gave him my human body, my soul, and my love.
The first time we joined as one was not quite in a sexual way. I wanted to show him the joyful freedom of riding the waves without a ship. I became the sea and I held him in my embrace and changed his form. We were more than just water. We were the very breath of the ocean. We were one. We were happy.
Later, we washed back up on the beach of our little island and I returned us to human form. Odysseus and I both wept at the loss of that closeness and he began kissing me with a ravenous hunger. The two of us wanted nothing more than to be one again. That first time we made love was so intense and violent that I was almost surprised that we each survived the other's passion. His touch was like nothing I had ever known. No one of my own race that I had lain with could compare because in Odysseus I had found someone that I truly loved. And, for a time at least, it seemed that he loved me in return. The hot fires of our passion fed off of one another and we found ourselves making love for days at a time. Gradually our heated, passionate joinings turned to sweet, gentle lovemaking. We were like a pair of young lovers, holding each other close in the night, making gentle love and whispering sweet nothings to each other. His caresses took me to a place that I had never been and I never wanted it to stop. For those first few years that he was with me, we were happy together. I even considered taking him before my father and asking him to join us as man and wife forever. I cherished the wild freedom of the sea, but I was willing to bind myself to Odysseus if he would stay with me forever and love me. I never wanted it to end. But it was not meant to be.
Slowly but surely, the memory of his lost family began to return to his mind. At first, I used my magic to keep the memories at bay and hold onto his love, but I had never truly had his heart to begin with. He had merely been held in the thrall of my otherworldly beauty and power. His true heart lay with another. I could not hold sway over him forever. The spell finally broke one night when he was making love to me. Suddenly, instead of the name "Calypso" passing his sweet lips as he kissed me, I began to hear the name "Penelope" and felt it burn my skin with every kiss. I became dead weight beneath him, hardening against his movements. When he finally released inside of me with a last blissful cry of, "PENELOPE!" he collapsed on top of me. But then he opened his eyes and realized that I was not his beloved Penelope, but an angry sea nymph who had just been crushed by betrayal.
"C-Calypso," he started, nervous. "I…I want to go home."
My anger exploded at that. How dare he! How dare he make love to me and let me believe that he loved me and then toss me aside like a mangy harlot! I would not stand for this! I was no common street whore! I was a goddess of the sea! A power to be reckoned with. I forced Odysseus beneath me and fucked him senseless.
I grew jealous and vengeful after that last night. Odysseus would no longer respond to my touch so I would force him to. Lovemaking was no longer a joy, but a tool I used to frighten him. I pushed him back to the brink that I had so generously brought him back from. I constantly reminded him of that fact but even that tactic failed. When appealing to his senses of guilt and fear failed to bind him to me, I fell to crying and pleading. I offered him the world, an eternity to walk the Earth, and a place among the immortals. But it did not matter to him that I was a goddess and all of my power would not persuade him. I was not his love and nothing I could give him would change that.
"What would I want with immortality, Calypso?" he once asked me. "Perhaps you will walk this Earth forever. Perhaps you will not. You once told me that it is we humans who give you your power. Where will you be if men cease to believe in you? If you are immortal then even that will not kill you. Will you just fade away as if you had never been? If you cannot die…did you truly live to begin with? If that is the case, if you are not truly alive, then I pity you this existence of yours."
I could not respond whenever he said things like that. I myself did not have an answer to those questions. Seven years came and went in that fashion before the greater deities finally remembered that Odysseus was still with me on my island. They got around to sending their messenger, then called Hermes, to demand his freedom.
"Great Zeus commands that he return home," Hermes said simply in the face of my pain.
"Why can the great ones not come and fetch their precious champion themselves? Why can they not face me as an equal?"
"Because you are not equals, Calypso," he explained gently, as if I were still a child. "Even your powers have limits. This is how it must be."
So I allowed my Odysseus to build a raft, and finally, allowed him to sail away from me.
"I will never forget you, Calypso!" he shouted as the raft was borne away on the waves.
That sent me over the edge. Giving me a taste of love and then snatching it away? What gave him the gall to say that he would never forget me? When he was far enough out at sea I summoned up the greatest storm that part of the world had ever known. My power had limits, did it? I would show them. I would show them all! I would cheat Athena of her "fated" champion. I would show the great ones that I had power. But above all else, I would show Odysseus that I was not to be trifled with. I would crush his bones on the rocks.
But…when the time came to finally push his pitiful raft under, I could not do it. Poor wretch that I was, I loved him still. I sent a wave to carry him to a distant land in order to spare him my whims. I then traveled across the seas to Odysseus' home in Ithaca. There I discovered his precious wife, Penelope. Her husband had been away nigh on twenty years and she had long since given him up for dead. But, despite the fact that many noble suitors pursued her favor, she remained faithful to his memory. I found that faithfulness extremely annoying, so I would torment her mind as she slept. In her dreams I would send her visions of Odysseus and I making love. I would let her hear the things we whispered to each other and feel the intense pleasures that we'd both experienced. I whispered things in her ear, like, "Your Odysseus is not dead. He is alive and well, and enjoying the love of other women. You are nothing to him. He was glad to get away from you. He is laughing at you while he is having his women. You will die alone and unloved!"
I recall after one particularly intense dream, the woman awoke wet and panting for her husband's touch. When she found that the visions of her husband and I passionately making love were only a nightmare, she called for one of her servants and had him make love to her, all the while calling him Odysseus. When it was over she sent him away, her head suddenly clear again. She sat alone in her chambers for some time, rocking herself and sobbing pitifully, seriously contemplating taking her own life because of her faithlessness. I just watched the scene and laughed. A part of me that remained in her mind screamed at her to put a dagger to her wrists. A part of me wanted her life-blood to be soaking the sheets of their bed when Odysseus finally returned. That would be the ultimate vengeance; for Odysseus to return home only to find that his beloved had taken her life only hours before. Penelope did indeed take up a dagger that night. I watched with spiteful glee as she placed the blade against her lily-white skin and anticipated the sight of her blood splashing onto the floor. But something, I know not what, made her stop. I had been deprived of the blood I wanted, but Penelope did not sleep for many nights after that, fearing that the horrible nightmares would return. I relished her suffering because it mirrored my own. Why should she be allowed to have Odysseus while I had been made to give him up? I wanted to see them die but I also understood that death was a release from the torment that I could inflict upon them. I tortured Penelope as best I could but Odysseus did eventually return to Ithaca and I could no longer bear to remain there. Instead I returned to the open ocean and unleashed my rage and pain onto unsuspecting sailors.
I paid no heed to the lessons my father had taught me so long ago. I slaughtered anyone foolish enough to cross my path. The sea had never before known such rage. Death clogged the waters of my father's domain and the great gods tried to force me to stop, but my pain could not be caged, not even by them. The deaths I caused filled my life. I felt the intense pain and loneliness of each of those webs that I tapped into when I killed, but I did not care. I fed off of their pain and sadness, perpetuating my own. If I had to suffer, then so did they! If they would force me to feel their pain, then they would be made to feel mine in return, and my sorrow could not be contained by any one mortal.
When at last I spent my rage, I returned to my little island, haunted by memories of what might have been. I passed out of legend completely. I believe some stories claimed that I had died from wanting Odysseus, but I assure you, that is not the case. I was too angry and still too much in love to allow myself to fade away. I hated myself for falling in love with Odysseus. I hated the great ones for giving him to me in the first place. I hated Odysseus for leaving me. My heart became a deep, black well filled with hate. I was so consumed by my hatred that I forgot my love for my own family. I forgot about the freedom of the ocean that I had cherished so fiercely. I became a prisoner of my own hatred. It was a long time before anyone dared to venture to my island.
It was my father who first came to me. He came to me in a form so frail that I was too shocked to lash out at him. He hobbled out of the water as a sickly old man, leaning on a walking stick. When the shock wore away I turned away from him, having no desire to speak to him or anyone.
"It's been so long since you've looked at me. Don't turn away," he commanded softly, somehow lacking the power that he had once prevailed over.
"Who are you to even speak to me?" I screamed at him. "You knew this would happen! You knew that Athena would send him to me. You let them take him from me!"
"Calypso, no one took him from you. Would you really have spent an eternity with someone who did not truly love you? It was not any of us that stood between you. It was Odysseus' own feelings. If you cannot see that, then there is nothing I can do for you. Odysseus' bones are dust now. Can you not let bygones be bygones?"
"I'll never let it go!" I hissed.
"Well, daughter, eternity is a long time to hold a grudge…especially against a people who are dying."
"Excuse me?"
"The day has come, Calypso," he said sadly. "Humans are being made to forget about us. Men from the middle lands are raising a new god. They call him Jesus Christ. They say that he is the only true god and that the rest of us are lies and evil demons. But even though they decry us as evil, at the same time they summon up pale incarnations of us as human saints. At first I thought these new incarnations would empower us, but the paradox they create only drains us of our power. As the years pass I find that more and more of our number have faded away. Many of your sisters are gone. I came here to see if you still lived."
"But…but what about mother?"
"She, too, is gone," he answered in a voice so thick with sorrow it did not seem possible that his frail human flesh could hold it.
"No, that's…no! It can't be true! I don't believe you. You're just trying to trick me into leaving the island."
"No, it is true. As surely as I stand before you, I am fading in power. I can no longer change form or become one with the sea. It is…torture. Being cut off from the sea, and from your mother. Sometimes I wish for death. Perhaps when I die, I will be reunited with her…and maybe I will not. Maybe I will simply cease to be. However, for the time being, I cannot die. I still have an obligation to this world. I must pass my duties on to you."
"What?" I whispered, shocked.
"I come to you so stripped of power that I can barely walk. But you, for some reason you have not diminished. Your skin still glows with the fire of your power. I do not know what it is that has spared you the fate of our people, but the fact of the matter is that you still live. I can see that you will continue to live. I see a life for you beyond our end. The ocean will never be the territory of these Christians. Someone must guard the secrets of its depths. That someone will be you." As he spoke, he hobbled towards me and placed a hand on my forehead. In a single flash, I saw the years ahead of me. I saw unending hate, pain, and rage. And then, so far in the future, so faint and brief that I was almost certain I was imagining it, a glimmer of light.
When my father stepped away from me, I collapsed to my knees, breathing hard.
"What did you do to me?"
"You will rule the seas from now on," he said as he walked back to the shore. "Calypso, I give you my blessing and farewell now. I do not expect that we shall ever meet again. But be of greater faith. Do not doubt that your mother and I love you."
Then he was gone, vanished into the ocean. For a long time I knelt where I had collapsed, staring at the point where he had disappeared. But suddenly I leapt up and ran towards the surf. I fought my way through the churning water in my puny human form. I swam like mad, foolishly hoping that I could still reach him.
"FATHER!"
"Do not doubt that we love you," his voice whispered on the wind. "You will never be alone."
"FATHER!" I screamed over and over again, even though I knew that he was gone. I swam farther than most humans could and finally allowed my body to sink beneath the waves. If I had been a true human I would have been drowned and crushed by the pressure of the deep. But neither of these unfortunate endings befell me. I just sank further and further. I sank to the bottom of the ocean. I curled into a ball in the dark bed of my new kingdom and wept, my tears mingling with the salt water. I had not wept in a long time. Ever since Odysseus' passing I had been empty of tears. But my father had brought me a new despair. I didn't want to believe that our end had finally come, but I could not deny the weakness my father had shown me. And what made him believe that I would outlive even the mightiest among us? It seemed to me that if they faded then I would too.
I do not know how long I lay hidden in that cold, dark abyss. I became one with the waters around me and did not see the light of day for that entire lost stretch of time. However, as time passed I came to accept the fact that I had not died. And…if I still lived, perhaps some of the others had also survived. At long last, I rose to the surface to seek my lost family.
The moment I tasted air once again, I knew that the world was different. New languages traveled on the air. New ships sailed the ocean. But I did not feel the presence of any of the spirits that had once roamed the seas. I searched far and wide but I could find none of my sisters. My father and mother, whose presence had so long filled the sea and my life, were gone. The only thing they had left behind was a simple melody, imprinted upon the rhythm of the waves and the sweet chords of the ocean breeze. It was a melody of love. Its words spoke of hope and loss, of the passage of life. It was sung by the remnants of my father's strength and my mother's guidance. For a long while that song was a lantern for me.
Somebody wants you.
Somebody needs you.
Someone is searching
For your heart alone.
Someone is dreaming,
Waiting and watching.
Someone is coming
To take you home.
Time, it will fly
Like the sun through the sky
And what once was hello
Turns to goodbye.
Tomorrow is hear now,
Sings in your ear now.
Child of my heart,
Your life is your own.
Never you fear now.
Your path is clear now.
Someone who loves you,
Someone who loves you,
Is taking you home.
Before long, I ventured to the lands where humans had worshipped us. I would have been happy to find even a lowly wood nymph at that point, but there was no one. Those lands belonged to the people my father had called Christians. There was nothing even remotely akin to nature in their societies. When my search failed to yield any results I traveled to the far west, to lands I had never seen before. I did find some spirits like me there, beings who were worshipped as deities, but the Christians were also moving in on their people. It would not be long before they, too, were forced to fade away. I returned to the ocean, heart-broken, afraid, and angry.
"THEY'RE ALL GONE!" I screamed. The howling winds carried my cries across the Earth. I stirred up the seas as never before. I pulled countless people away from the sun and down to lie with me in the darkness of my realm. I abandoned my human forms entirely and became the rage of the ocean. Never had I known such loss, not even when Odysseus left me. Back then my rage had been directed at my fellow deities. Now it was man that I made to feel my lonely pain. I hated the humans. How could these people let us fade away as if we were nothing? If this god of theirs so loved the world, why was it a good thing to destroy in his name? It made me angry to see dying men fall to their knees and pray to him. It did nothing. After all, the sea was my domain and he, like any deity that came before him, had his limits.
Once again, the seas became clogged with death, and now there was no help for it. Charon was long gone and the Christians' new god was too high and mighty to venture out to the ocean to collect the dead and guide them to the other side. It was not something I could do, for I, too, had limits. As the death toll mounted, my rage started to lessen because I was beginning to see that killing was not giving me the release I sought. Murder would not bring me the answers I desired. Why had I been spared while everyone else had died? Why was I still alive? What cruel trick of fate had seen fit to leave me all alone in the world? Why was I chosen to guard the seas from faithless humans? Why not one of my many sisters? Why me? As time went by, the song my parents had left for me was replaced by my own melody. My song spoke of love found and lost, of hope and despair, of sadness and loneliness that knew no bounds. It was a melody that reflected the depths of my kingdom, and the depths of my own wild, broken heart. And somehow, like me, the song felt incomplete. Perhaps it was a reflection of the way I was doomed to spend my days.
So, am I truly a goddess? Heh. I do not know. Still I wonder the endless ocean in search of my answer. I shall probably never have it. I do not know what I am…and soon, it may not matter.
XxX
(A/N) Well, there's the first chapter. Tell me what you think and if you have any interest in my continuing with it. Davy Jones will make his appearance next chappie.
Btw, the song that appeared in this chapter is called "Taking You Home". It's from the movie Wolf Quest.