Nymphs weren't always extinct.
They used to roam freely, their hands intertwined with that of the land, burdened with peace and prosperity. Marked with prints of devotion; so entangled with the thready pulse of earth itself, they could whisper it back to strength when weak and lull it to rest when stricken with change. Nymphs used to live, and die, like all natural things do.
Amalfi lived.
Amalfi died, too. Because Amalfi was once a nymph—before she became a legend, a city, a hope, and a trap. Before she became a story, haunting his lips and caressing his mind; before she was a tale that came to an end, one he couldn't bear to tell but would die not to forget. Before the fires, the waves, before she was his beloved escape and most beautiful defiance—
Amalfi was once a nymph.
Amalfi was a nymph, and he was once somebody.
He knew that. Deep down, he so willingly knew he was once somebody great, somebody mighty. He must have been. He was surely important; his body was littered with scars of battle, his arms felt uncertain without the grip of a blade, his reflexes were too sharp and electric for mundane living. But who he was and who he wasn't, if anyone at all, wasn't his to know anymore. He had no recollection of even his name.
If he tried hard enough, maybe he could remember. Maybe he could grasp it with desperate hands, and yank it back from the iron grips of leering fates who despised him... but he wasn't sure he was ready to. Not when she looked at him like that. Not when his lack of memory let him stay here by her side, between the sloping cliffs and the patient sea. He would cling to his false name; he would hide from the very gods themselves for as long as he could. He had a nagging feeling they weren't very happy with him. Something in him warned they wouldn't let him stay when he remembered—and he wanted to stay.
But he remembered a ship. A strike of lightning. A beautiful nymph chasing him off the beach he'd washed up on. He remembered it all, and he would remember her story, and the monsters, and the lemons.
Because Amalfi was once a nymph.
And nymphs didn't use to be extinct.
As there are those drawn to Verona, there will be others seduced by an older, more ancient death of young love, where it quietly throbs on the Campanian coast. Years, decades, centuries, millennia—time cannot fully wash away the stain of bled-dry hearts from history, nor from the memories of the land itself.
It remembers. We vow not to forget.
It remembers; how could it not? The sea had once kissed her skin, eager each time she'd welcomed its embrace. Tangling her hair with foamy fingers, bringing her gifts carried from ocean floors; it'd once given beauty chase and been chased in return. Now, waves will forever skim the sand for some surviving trace, denying that even the empty indents she used to fill are gone, too.
It remembers; how could it not?
The wind had once formed a habit of cooing lullabies, gentle for the ease of her cries. Beginning from her earliest exposure as a babe, a ritual of nature's devotion, until that inevitable dusk when the very air was wrenched from her dying frame. Now, the wind mouths melodies with no familiar ear to accept it, routine turned last comfort its gusts still refuse to relinquish.
It remembers; how could it not?
The earth had once held her close while she slept, gentle form cradled under looming cliffs, safe under watchful stars, the loving embrace of soil warmed for her comfort. Now, those same cliffs are no longer the same. They will never be the same, having buckled under her screams and shuddered loose at the sound of her lover's torment. Fallen to its knees at the realization of grievous permanency, they remain low to this day, unable to regain the strength they once possessed.
It remembers; how could it not?
The land knows what it lost.
Before there was Verona, there was Campania. Before there were bloody cobblestones and smeared church floors, vials and blue-blushed lips, naive folly and rash ultimatums, there was the millennia-old embrace of two other doomed lovers under ancient, silver skies.
Before there was Juliet, there was Amalfi. The label of a hero was eternally given when death was a witness, embroidered on her by the grieving minds of loved ones, sealed by oaths of remembrance. The spread of marvelous tales promised her she would be remembered as even more than she was.
Before there was death, there was life. Trembling, pulsing, breath-giving life. It was traded, never reclaimed. It was stolen, gifted; offered in a palm extended, hands cupped to cushion the tender pulp of delicate citrus. The clench of pale fingers—until it broke, as all things must—for a tender stomach or hungry earth. Its bleeding carcass always trailed down wrists, wounds left stinging.
Before there were lemons to taste, there was the tang of her kiss. Sour as sin, sweet as sanctuary, sacred as slumber. The tongue had always welcomed the ache, the teeth had always longed for the gush of that same meaty pulp, the throat had always tensed in greedy need to quench what burned.
Before there was fire, there was him. Him—oh, how she'd loved him. They'd burned even brighter than the flames that eventually consumed her; her flesh and soul had been claimed long before the first touch of a curious blaze.
Before there was extinction,
Before there was demise,
Before there was loss,
There was Amalfi.