The sea was a loving mother to me, in life and in death.
It took me with grace when my heart stopped beating, keeping me safe in its depths where nothing bad could ever reach me. I became a part of it; its servant, daughter, devotee. When my body wasted away, I came to exist in the foam of the ocean's waves, in the light reflected on its surface, the tides carrying all of its life and hope, and the soft hum it made to the ears of the chosen.
I am the sea, and the sea is me.
If you were to ask me how long it's been, or who I am, I would not answer you. Time does not exist in the loving embrace of the ocean, instead replaced by an everlasting sense of fluidity, of adoration and belonging and home. In it, nothing is itself, nothing has a name, there is only the water, the water, the water.
It is as much as any being could wish for.
I am the hand of the sea, holding the humans who come too close. I embrace them, whisper to them, cradle them in my arms as they join me. Each time someone visits the sea of our tears, I am there, beckoning and waiting, weeping with them. I understand what it means to never have been loved, to have been betrayed and left behind to rot alone until the stars cease and the tears dry out and the world stops.
If I had a heart it would ache with the weight of my task. It has been my sole purpose for as long as I can remember, as if nothing but these moments, these lives and deaths, exists.
But the sea has been growing restless recently. It seems to be starved, hungry for something I can't quite name, like it is missing a dear lover so much it's been crashing against the rocks on shore, swallowing ships and sailors hoping to be satiated and tearing the skies down in rain in an effort to drown out the world. It's been moving bodies and waters to find whatever it so longs for, and I have never held so many dying hands.
Emerging out of nothing, I get the sense of today—of time. Perhaps the ocean gets that at times, perhaps it can tell what happens sometimes as it knew when my father was about to kill me. The creatures have been sluggish, nervous in movement, the heavens have been uneasy and constantly try to reach out to the sea, to meet it with drops of rain and soothe it, tell it it's okay. The sea is like Agony that way. It can never be quiet—it's doomed to never be at peace.
The waves make glorious swooshing sounds somewhere above, they echo in the deep and rumble through the sand, swirling it along the ocean floor like it's dancing. Rays of sunlight that venture into the water are weak here, but their perseverance is that of gods.
The rays interest me. They seem to be expanding, almost enveloping the area around, stretching and spreading in a wall of golden beams. They reach me, whatever I am, and I might never have felt such blissful warmth in my life: the sun itself, caressing my skin, igniting a small fire in my mind and showering me with such heat I would bathe in it forever if I could. My candle, the one I used to light in my cave, it brought a similar happiness, and I feel as calm as an unborn child in her mother's womb.
The ocean is swaying me like it loves me, it cradles me, carries me gently all the way up to its waiting surface. Waves grab ahold of me and I must have a body now, for their might shakes the world and sprinkles me with bubbles of air and I've never felt lighter.
Just then do I come to know that the sea is raging, when I realise that it's throwing me around instead, passing me from wave to wave like I'm a ball to be played with. The ocean becomes wild and it loses control, haphazardly tosses my body, water, fish, everything. The billows climb higher and higher towards the sky, only to tip over and crash back down in a flurry of salt and foam and sway the whole world.
The sea takes a mighty, desperate leap. I am nothing but odd limbs and yet I'm flying through the air amongst the last specks of salt water. I must have a stomach, as it drops when I meet the ground and there's never been anything more mortal about me.
The ocean washes away and backs down, turns quiet in expectance—it doesn't dare to speak, it's a curious, insatiable creature. I think I'm lying on grass. I haven't felt grass in such a long time.
I have a head. I lift it. The wind is blowing on me, gently; get up, it says, it strews my hair about and dries it for me. What a good friend, as it lifts me so that I'm on my feet.
I am brought to glorious life when I hear:
"It worked."
YOU ARE READING
Daughter of the Sea
Fantasy--- To me, the water was a mother's warm embrace, the gales a trusted friend, the sea-glass a treasured secret kept safe under my lumpy pillow. My own father, however, was the bane of me, and I grew to hate every second I had to hear his raspy voice...
