What Once Was Lost

It all began with a ship.  She rested in the docks, the wind fluttering across her closed sails.  The waves gently splashed against her hull.  Loud laughs, singing and conversation flowed across the docks from many other ships, but the crew of this ship was much louder than the rest.  Their worn leather boots, aged too quickly with the salt water, thundered across the docks as they moved cargo to and from the ship.

He heard the thumping of the more familiar boots before he felt the hand that clapped his shoulder.  It jostled him, but he merely chuckled.  A much gentler and softer hand squeezed his arm.  Those same fingers brushed a lock of his red hair out of his eyes.

“So what do you think of our ship, Daniel?”  A male voice asked.

Daniel turned to the ship once more, “Though I cannot see her, she is beautiful.  It is almost as if…she were calling to me.  And the sea…it is as if she calls me too.”

“Then I guess you ought to go to them.  No since keeping a lady waiting.”  A female voice said.

He chuckled again and then stepped forward.  There was a simple hesitation before his own wore leather boots stepped onto the deck of a ship for the very first time.  Every worry vanished.  And he knew at once that this was where he belonged.  Finally he had found what he had been looking for, a place to belong, a place he could call home.

The years passed by quickly.  Every day Daniel and his Captain dueled and Daniel soon became more familiar with battling and traveling across the deck without the use of his eyes.  He even began to sense the sea itself, guide it through his other much more sharpened senses.  Life as he knew it changed completely and he felt at peace, at home even through the hardships.

But all of that ended during the storm.  He lost everything he had found.  He lost his home, his love, the family he’d become to love and his Captain…his best friend.  He washed ashore, the only survivor.  And then there was imprisonment, torture, but none of it compared to the pain of his loss.

More years passed by far too slowly.  And then he stood on a beach, the skeleton of a ship standing before him.  He stared up at the wooden bones that loomed over him.  And then he began his work, building her and giving her life.  The sea called him.  It was home.  How could he be away from his home though he had lost so many loved ones?

Even more years passed by, but now he stood on the deck of his own ship.  A crew rumbled across the deck, seeing to the running of the ship.  Beside him a woman laced her arm into his and two red-haired twin boys raced about the deck.

And then the man Daniel had once called Captain walked onto the deck.

The Crystal Gardens

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”  She asked.

“Yes, it is.”  He answered, but his gaze was not on the crystals that clung to every surface of the garden.  It was on her, standing before him in a simple light blue gown.  Her golden hair fell down her back in a gentle waterfall.  Some of it had been pulled back and pinned together with a crystal flower.

From the first moment he’d met her, he had thought she was beautiful, but it was in this moment that he truly realized just how beautiful she was.  He felt his heart beat a little faster as she moved closer to him to view a cluster of blood red crystals.  He wanted to lean in, to tell her how much he loved her, but he didn’t.  After all, how could she love a criminal like him?

He was a man that would take the life of another at the drop of a hat.  It was true that he wanted to help people, to heal them as she did, but he was not afraid to take a life either.  It was how he’d lived his life for so long.  In the beginning, it was the money; the need to survive that drove him against his childhood innocence.  And after a while when the money didn’t matter anymore, it became his life.

“It’s called the Crystal Gardens.  The story goes that an elven princess stumbled into the cave one day.  She had been running from an evil enchantress who sought to cut off her golden hair.  Her hair, you see, had magical properties.  It could heal minor wounds and even reverse aging.  She stayed here in the cave for many years only going out to find what food she could.”  She said as she looked up at the ceiling, watching the star-lit sky twinkle high above them.

“Did the enchantress ever find her?”  He asked.

She shook her head, “Don’t you remember?  Every fairy tale ends with happily ever after.  When three years had passed a man stumbled into the cave, a human man.  The princess was afraid the evil enchantress had sent him, but when she saw him she fell deeply in love with him.  She immediately thought this was a spell of course, so she forced him from her sanctuary.”

“Not everything can end in happily ever after…” he commented quietly.

She laughed softly and it sent a shiver of desire through him.  She turned to look at him, “Well this one ends with happily ever after.”

“Thanks for spoiling the ending.”  He grumbled, smirking.

She laughed again.

“So how does it end?”

“Well, when the princess shoved the man out of her cave, he tripped and fell onto a cluster of crystals outside the cave.  Seeing him injured, the princess rushed out to help him.  The moment she left her cave, the enchantress appeared.”

“I don’t see how this is going to end happily ever after.”  He said.

She smiled, “That’s because you’re not looking at it positively.  You see the world as black.  Around every corner is another struggle, another battle, but what you need to do is open your eyes.  There will always be another struggle, but we make it through those and we have our happily ever after.”

He chuckled at her, shaking his head, “Are you going to tell me the end of the story or just lead me in circles again?”

She laughed, “The enchantress had grown old with age.  Her skin was wrinkled and her hair was whiter than the beautiful red it had once been.  As the princess knelt by the man, the enchantress dove at her with a dagger in her hand.  The man was not so injured to not stand, so he pushed the princess out of the way and the enchantress stabbed him instead.”

He studied her as he listened.  Would he dive in front of her if someone sought to kill her?  He didn’t need to think about it for long.  He would take the dagger for her too.  Through their travels she had annoyed him beyond reason.  At one point they had even parted ways in bad terms, but somehow here they stood together.

“The princess saw what the man had done and she became angry.  The man had done nothing but come to rest in her cave and she had shoved him out the door, even injured him and now here he lay dying because of her.  But it wasn’t just because of her.  She couldn’t control what the man did or what the enchantress did.  All she could have done is let him rest in her cave awhile, but she had not done so.”  She continued.

She was closer now, her fingers almost brushing his own as they stood there.  He wanted to put his arm around her, pull her close to him, but he couldn’t find the strength to handle her rejection.  He watched her in silence as she licked her lips and continued her story once more.

“She broke off one of her precious crystals and thrust it into the enchantress’s heart while she was distracted.  Something amazing happened then.  The crystal grew bright and bright.  It spread over the enchantress’s body and encased her in crystal.”

“What happened to the man?”  He asked.

“I’m getting to that.”  She chuckled and lightly slapped his arm.  “When the enchantress was defeated, the princess knelt by the man.  He was barely alive.  The princess cupped his cheek and promised to help him.  He smiled and told her it was okay, that death was merely part of life and he was glad to have laid his eyes upon such a beautiful woman as she before he died.”

He started to ask another question, but she pressed her finger to his lips.  It surprised him and he forgot what he had been going to ask her.

“She began to cry as she loosened her hair from its braid.  She knew of the properties of her magical hair, so she lay her long hair over the man’s wound and pleaded from the healing to come to her.  But nothing happened.  Again and again she pleaded, but still nothing happened.  Her tears began to fall more and more until they were streaming down her face.  She bowed her head and several tears fell upon the man’s wound.  She thought him lost, but when his hand tipped her chin upward she broke into happier tears.”

She smiled and withdrew her hand from his lips and waited.

“And…they lived…happily ever after?”  He asked.

She laughed softly and stepped closer to him, “Yes.  They did.”

The Pirate and the Song of Despair

He reached for her.  There she was as she always was still stained in the blood of maker and now stained in his blood.  Her blackened hull glistened under the light of the moon that shone through the window of his cabin.  She was the embodiment of darkness.  She stole the moon and the light around the cabin, swallowed it for her own.  She rendered the cabin in darkness and yet from her there was light within her reek of dusk, her shadow and the night.

His fingers brushed across the familiar silver strings that sang of the moon which had first spun them to life.  And she sang out in desire, calling him to stroke her strings once more, to give her song life and not the death of silence.  But in her own way it was death she sought and it was in silence that she lived for she was broken.  Her murky hull lay intact, but her heart sang of loss and sorrow.  Her song searched the night searched the very sea for the one she had lost.

Years had passed and still her song never found him.  And so she wept in song and in the tears of blood that flowed down her neck swirling into the great depths of the sea that adorned her back.  The waves crashed with every mournful cry with every song of sorrow that she sang.  They crashed and crashed, churning each wave of fresh tears that sprang anew.

But all was not completely lost for after so many years of lying at the bottom of the ocean she had found one who shared her song of loss.  And it was he who caressed her silver strings.  It was he who reached out and held her as a lover, kissed her neck and gave her life after so many years of silence.  Together they searched the sea, searched the world and even the sky for those they had lost.

“I give you life…”  He whispered to her.

She sang out in reply.

“And I bring you death…”

And she sang one more echoing the sorrow that rippled through his whispers.  Though she had life she wished for death to be with the one she lost.  So she reached into the dark night seeking those souls lost at sea for hope that one of them may be the one that she had lost.  Or perhaps they would be the one who he had lost.

It was with hope that they became one bonded through despair, bonded through blood and life.  It was that hope which washed away the waves of despair that wreaked their hearts.  And so each night they sang as one in their never-ending search.  His arms would embrace her and her song would cry out.  And each night a wandering soul stood before them.

“Do you wish death?”  He asked the ghostly apparition that stood before him.

“No.”  Some wailed.

“I wish rest.”  Another cried.

“Then I give you life…”  He said as his palm lay upon their chest, “And I give you…death.”

Before their very eyes one soul breathed again, the body healed and full of life.  The other smiled and began to fade feeling the peace it had sought for centuries.  And before their very eyes their Captain would tumble to the deck.  Bringing death is an easy task, but to give life to that which once was held in death is no easy task.

Everything has a price.  And his price was pain.  It was the pain of death.  It was the death of those who he had given life.  He would relive their death, feel all that they had felt and he would be pulled toward death.

No!  Her song sang out!  Her song tugged on his soul, held him fast to her, crying out for him to stay!

And so he stayed.  He was alive and well, but with the pain of death always upon his shoulders, always tugging at him with every life he brought back from the dead.  Every few nights he would suffer while another lost soul found death of found life once more.  And every night she is there singing to him to hold him steady.

Darkness and Light

Sorrow

If ever the embodiment of darkness could be captured, the violin would have done so or perhaps she had already for her hull was the darkest of night.  She beckoned the darkness to join her, beckoned death to seek her out and caress her frame.  She rejected all light that swam over her blackened body and yet she drew the light to her.  But there was more to her than the reek of dusk.

Anger

Death and life she called, but blood she desired.  Streams of glistening red dripped down her neck and tainted the never-ending blackness that drank in the light.  But perhaps it was not blood she desired for even now her song cried in pain.  But there was more to her than the pain that ripped down her casing.

Calm

Just as the ocean waves crash against the hull of a ship upon her waters, so too did they crash upon the violin for as light draped over her it gave birth to the shimmering sea that adorned her back.  Deep blue flowed to light blue green and drifted into the bright blue and white of sea foam.  Even as she sat still, the waves drenched her back.  But even then there was still more to her than the storm that breeched her hull.

Storm

As the redness dripped down her neck it flowed through the sea, stained the never-ending storm.  And yet the sea drank her in.  It welcomed her and wrapped its waves around her like a blanket.  It kept her warm and safe, crashing over her body to envelope her entire being.  She became the sea and the sea became her life-blood.  But there was more to her than the bond of her mistress.

Agony

Her strings were made of the purest silver spun into delight strands to adorn her body.  And yet the threads were not silver for they were stained in the blood of her player.  Fresh droplets soaked into the silver giving way to her most recent endeavor.  But there was more to her than her hungry threads of spun silver.

Life

Her song was that of a siren’s call stretching and reaching far across the waters.  She called to the lost ones.  She sang her desires and her promises of life or peace.  But her song was not one of death though it sang of the deaths of the lost ones.  She called to them, to those lost souls and she wrapped her song around them offering peace or life renewed.  The choice was always in the hands of the lost.  But there was more to her than the siren song that sought lost souls.

Sacrifice

As with all things, her song came with a price for she could not give life without taking life.  The balance must be maintained.  She would not take the life of her player for who would then play her and help her bring the lost souls home?  No, she would not slay her love, her dear companion of life and of death.  But a price was sought and that price was pain.  As she breathed life into the lost souls, she took their death and gave it to her player.  Whoever played her would feel the pain of death for every soul that gained life and every soul that sought peace.  But there was more to her than the price of her song.

Grief

Her melody was not one of happiness.  No, her melody was that sorrow hidden deep within the heart.  She sought it out, tugged at it and pulled it to the surface.  Sorrow she sought.  Grief she drank.  But there was more to her than her desire to heal the grief that lies hidden within the depths of the heart.

Death

There was another.  But her twin did not sing with her for he lay in two shattered pieces.  If ever the embodiment of light could be captured, he would have done so for his hull had once been the purest of white.  But he did not sing.  He lay in two pieces.  His strings of spun silver lay frayed and broken.  And the sea that once stormed over his hull now lay dormant in a never-ending peace.  But there was more to him than his fragmented body.

Despair

His melody could not be spoken of for he had not spoken in centuries.  He desired to sing, but how could he when his body was so broken?  As if his fragmented body were not enough to weight down his heart, he, like the lost souls, lay lost and ship wrecked at the bottom of the ocean.  No, he would not sing again though his strings tried desperately to cry out.

Hope

One day she would find him.