Demon Stories

Cheol: Lady of the Sea, 1911, Northwest Passage, the Arctic

Cheol

Lady of the Sea

1911, Northwest Passage, the Arctic

Bitter wind. 

It was a bitter wind which signaled me of her nearness, for her heart was the coldest and bitterest of us all. A love scorned woman. The most vile, temptuous, hatred-filled woman.

How had she found again the only sort of person who could know who she was? 

On deck I was, on the look out for icebergs. I was the only one who could withstand the cold. They knew me as a man who had been on these passages before, one who could withstand the cold better than they. However, I was only using them to get to Europe.

It was while I was on this deck, many weeks into the voyage when the men were perishing, that she showed up. Mysteriously, blindly, perhaps. But the earth told me of her before she showed herself to me. Maybe she miscalculated, desiring to show herself to another man. However it was unfortunate circumstance. 

The doors on the ship rattled with the freezing arctic wind, and I did not move. The black water of the night was still despite the wind. For this I knew it was no ordinary wind. 

"Ysobel, you devil woman," I whispered through my teeth to myself, for these words needed to be said. Any time to curse her very name aloud.

Where was she? By sky or by sea? I could only wait.

The only sounds were the gentle rockings of the ship and my calm, deep breathing. All was still, as if waiting, expecting, to be punctuated by her presence. 

Just as I thought I had miscalculated myself, about to look forward again, I saw it.

Tiny, small lights in the water far forward. I could only compare them to perhaps in the modern era when there were fairy lights in the trees at Christmas time. These tiny lights, glowing themselves in the black water, piercing the black water as if they were not even there, as if they were independent beings on the world. They appeared to mix in with this earth from another universe, removed from reality but still real.

My eyes squinted at them. They rose and fell, as if on waves but there were no waves this night. Not at all. Gently and fluctuating on light, they seemed to come towards us but yet stayed in the same place. The eyes do weird things when you are on the edge of the world, and many a sailor could vouch for this. Yet my eyes were not normal eyes. She could trick my demon eyes in this way mysteriously, and this showed her power over me, using her allure on me as one who likes such creatures as her as any other man.

I did not blink, not once. I could not let her suddenly change if my gaze were to go away from her even for a moment. 

Unbreakingly, the lights floated on the water. Then suddenly, they began to move with frightening movements. This way, that way. Erratic, as if possessed and crazy, just as her soul is. It was here I knew she could sense me and had realized me quickly and by surprise. She had indeed not expected me to be here.