You are born in water. You die made of water. Water sees you come, and water sees you go. It is in your eyes, your blood, your soul. Does it bind you, free you or is it a chain? If you enjoy this tale, leave a comment and more like it might come this way.
1836 CE
The wolf-masked stranger so frightened them, they tied a noose about his neck. They shoved him off the port bow, letting him drag behind their swift sloop. Slaves below deck heard their laughter. The devils riding among the slavers giggled.Then there was a splash from the sea. Saltwater elongated in a tentacle. The wolf-masked man rose upon that wave, beside a woman in a blue-gray cloak. Dolphins of blue, silver and green adored her cloak.
The white-skinned maiden wore nothing but saltwater and her cloak. But her shaved head and glowing white eyes commanded the sea. Men screamed in fear. They panicked. They fired shots at the witch they saw before them.
Muskets missed their marks as the sea witch gave the slaver lives back to the sea. Twenty sailors left the world, drowning. Much less pain than those in the hold beneath them had gone through.
401 CE
They brought the small boy to her that midwinter. They came down to her cave. The blue cloaked crone smiled at the sight of their company. She stepped out of the dark, the cold vapors of the sea about her.The boy looked up at her.
His eyes were large as shells, she thought. He trembled.
"Is Delphi so scary to one only beginning his journey?" She asked.
The boy shivered, hesitating. Still.
"You are Delphi? Grandfather said I had to ask-"
"You and yours never can. Your father couldn't and your grandfather couldn't either. Doesn't matter." The dark-haired woman bent down, revealing she wore only the wet cloak, despite the chill of winter. The boy could see sigils and runs embroidered on it.
"I- I- why do come to us?" The boy stammered
"This is the beginning. All things begin with the water." She whispered to him. "You have it in you, but need someone to tell you to take the first step. I can see where that step leads, but I can't force it on you. They call me Delphi. What is your name, child?"
"Merlin."
"Merlin, if you wish to know the path before you, take my hand," Delphi said. "And I will show you how to start a journey the world will never forget."
1836 CE
The boy trembled as the wolf-masked man and the woman in the wet cloak landed upon the deck. She opened her hands, the water about her turning from tentacles to vapor and fog. Splashes and screams from the slavers in the roiling sea echoed behind her.I should hide, the boy told himself. But he couldn't. He trembled in fear. It locked him.
"I am called Delphi." The woman said. She gentled bent down, enough to look into his green eyes.
"Robert." He squeaked.
"Robert, Robert." The woman seemed to taste the words. Then her eyes flashed. "Ah. I see."
"See what?" The man in the wolf-mask asked.
"Quiet." She told him. "Robert? We aren't going to hurt you if you obey."
"Y-yes." Robert replied.
"This is a slaving ship. But we came because it is also full of demons. Do you understand?"
"Slaves. Right. They are demons too?"
The bald woman sighed. She reached out a water-pruned hand and touched Robert's small head. The cabin boy screamed as a vision washed over him.
2551 BCE
"Ha!" The woman in the wolf mask responded."You laugh at Delphi?" The man in the wet cloak replied.
"We both know that this isn't the beginning of anything. That the pyramids that they raise over there have been only the middle part of our tale." The dark-skinned woman in the wolf-mask gestured to the other side of the Nile river in the distance. There was a wry tone to her voice. "Yet you tell me you are here to share the beginning of the journey with me?"
The cloaked man sighed.
"Damn you Lupis. Everyone else appreciates prophecy, but you have to cheat the idea altogether." Delphi responded.
"And you love enlightening the unenlightened. Unlike some of us, you better the world, although don't you ever want to do something directly?" Lupis replied. "You and the waters you command could take down a devil or demon or three. Maybe help expand the possible choices for those you help find their way."
The man waded back into the water. The water went up to his knees.
"Spilling blood you mean, for your constant task?"
"Spilling blood to stop suffering. To create freedom. Happiness."
Delphi looked up at her.
"For someone who refuses to a crown-" He growled.
"-I certainly like to give commands?" Lupis finished her tone with a bit of humor to it.
Both looked at each other, but Delphi felt embarrassed at having to agree with Lupis this time. Like the other times. Both before them and to come.
1836 CE
The cabin boy vomited. "How... what? How did you know my name? What did you show me?!""I'll be below." The wolf-masked man told the cloaked woman, her skin still glistening with saltwater. "Don't break him."
"The future can't break the vessel that will carry it, Lupis." She retorted. She helped the boy back to his feet. "Robert Greensmith, do you need a moment more?"
"My name. How do you know it?" He shivered in fear. But her eyes looked at him with something he hadn't seen since the ship had kidnapped him in Dublin.
"A strange man grabbed you. Took you to his ship, and whipped you when you tried to get away. Those tears didn't go away to nothing. They fell somewhere."
"I don't understand. That doesn't explain what you showed me. It hurt. I felt- I was somewhere I never been before. Twas dark as night. And I heard gunfire. Horrible..."
The woman pressed a finger to his lips.
"I am the Delphi. And I can't see the future. But the waters know. I can open it to others. A glimpse of something you are destined for. I'd hoped it would help you." She closed her eyes. "You have a choice, boy. Either your vision enlightened you, and this slaving ship is something you want to help fight. Or it isn't, and you ignore it. Either way, I can't abide harm to one who hasn't even seen the path they walk yet. Innocence should mean something."
The boy shook his head.
"The future? The priests back home always spoke of witchcraft like that, but I thought it just... tales to scare us to be good or old stories of when people hated things they didn't understand-"
"People still hate what they don't understand," Delph told him. "Like water in the sea or air in the sky, fear of the unknown is a constant."
"You won't kill me? I have a choice?" Robert asked.
"In that hold below us, are spirits born from the suffering this ship makes. Demons and other ill things. Poisonous things that feed on their suffering. Pains and wicked droplets. Sin. You can sense it when you feel the wrongness of an act. We don't just want to free people because it's the right thing, Robert.
"I do the right things because it keeps the demons weaker. So even though killing you would be prudent, it wouldn't solve the true stain here. So yes. You have a choice. And I'll respect it, rather than risk ruining the spiritual side of my actions here. You understand?"
He shook his head.
Nonetheless, he made a choice before the woman whose voice was as gentle as low tide.
1863 CE
The Irish man pulled the burlap bag from the ebony-skinned girl's head."Go! C'mon hurry!"
"You never said why!" Her voice squeaked. The embroidered cloak clung tight to her. "And you-"
"The bullet is a wee thing." The man was out of breath. A ragged breath. He couldn't follow the girl, but the Canadian border was so close. The bandage kept the blood back, but Robert Greensmith had known for most of his life what it was.
"You're bleeding!" She yelled, pulling at him. "Come with me!"
"Nay." He turned toward the light in the distance coming at them. "I saw this coming a long time ago. A wise woman once told me the choice matters. That we all begin and end in the waters."
"What?" She shook her head.
But the baying hounds seemed to grow closer. He couldn't follow. Not if she had to fight him.
So she ran into the night. The old Irishman turned and faced the vision that had plagued him the last 27 years. The noise in the night. The bullets. Something seen through the waters.
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