The sea, the sea
is singing.
The pitched waves roll up against the cliffsides of the continent, and along the coast; they lash at sand and rock and earth and say, come to me come to me come to me.
Calyndar,
do you hear her?
She is singing to you, to you.
Somewhere out against the surf a trio of gulls dive beneath the surface, attracted to some flurry of activity beneath the tumultuous waves. Then they are ascending again, violent, their screams echoing out above the thunder of the waves.
Calyndar,
do you see how restless you have made her?
You pace, to and fro, and wear solid tracks into the sand.
She wants to soothe you and each wave reaches closer, closer, but cannot. Because she also wants you to suffer.
She always does, the sea. She sends out the wind to caress you, to pull you. Come closer, come closer.
Those final thoughts are not the sea’s.
They are Boudika’s, from where she rests among the surf, a transient shape that bucks and rolls with the waves. She has learned this weave-and-bob well, this swell and deflation, the way to ride the waves as if she belongs to them.
(It is because. She does belong to them.)
And she has been watching, hungrily. It is the water horse in her. It is the sea. She will never be sated and forever that hunger manifests in different ways; all to often it is for horse-flesh, but she has yet to succumb to the urges. She merely teases the idea, as one does an unrequited love; it makes her suffer, and the suffering is delicate and somehow pleasurable. Yes, Boudika would be a liar if she did not think of all the forms she could take to kill and consume. Yes, Boudika would be a liar if she were to ignore the way her muscles tremble with restraint and the saliva pools in long against her teeth and is then lost to the sea.
It is only when she is certain that she can control these urges does she emerge.
First, Boudika is a speck of red—her mane where it lashes in the froth of the waves when she surfaces, her head emerging from one long break of surf. She snorts out salt water and mist. Then, it is her bald face catching the glint of light from the clouds; she is whiter than white, stark as bone, where that uneven mask covers her crimson face.
Then, a shoulder—and two. Her striped haunches and a lashing, leonine tail. Boudika exits the waves in a thunder; the water sloughs off of her like a second skin. She cannot help but toss her head. She cannot help but buck and rear and then settle into an impassioned canter that slows only when she is near enough to speak.
She thinks, you were not alone.
Only a man who believes he is abandoned paces in such a way. Only a man who believes there is no witness.
Boudika does not bother with pleasantries.
“You’ve nearly worn a canyon into my shoreline.” Her voice comes out high and bright. Her mouth tilts into a smile; on anyone else’s face, it would have been friendly. On Boudika it splits her face in two with rows of shark’s teeth. “What troubles you?”
Once, Boudika would have said, this is a dangerous place to pace and think.
Once, Boudika would have warned, you should stay away from the sea.
Now Boudika thinks,
come closer, come closer.
The water horse trembles, and trembles, and it is the sea on her and behind her and the way the coastline always feels on the precipice of storm, of breaking. She stands at the war of worlds, where the sea meets the sand, where the ocean asks the land to concede and the land refuses. For now.
Come closer, come closer.
Oh, how she hungers. It is in the depth of her eyes. Boudika paces, back and forth, a shallow line in comparison to his track. She cannot stay still. Her socked legs dance against the sand; she tosses her head. The gulls continue to scream. Everything is movement. And he is dark like a shadow is dark. There is just enough storm in the air to make Boudika want to take him.
"Speech." || @Calyndar
is singing.
The pitched waves roll up against the cliffsides of the continent, and along the coast; they lash at sand and rock and earth and say, come to me come to me come to me.
Calyndar,
do you hear her?
She is singing to you, to you.
Somewhere out against the surf a trio of gulls dive beneath the surface, attracted to some flurry of activity beneath the tumultuous waves. Then they are ascending again, violent, their screams echoing out above the thunder of the waves.
Calyndar,
do you see how restless you have made her?
You pace, to and fro, and wear solid tracks into the sand.
She wants to soothe you and each wave reaches closer, closer, but cannot. Because she also wants you to suffer.
She always does, the sea. She sends out the wind to caress you, to pull you. Come closer, come closer.
Those final thoughts are not the sea’s.
They are Boudika’s, from where she rests among the surf, a transient shape that bucks and rolls with the waves. She has learned this weave-and-bob well, this swell and deflation, the way to ride the waves as if she belongs to them.
(It is because. She does belong to them.)
And she has been watching, hungrily. It is the water horse in her. It is the sea. She will never be sated and forever that hunger manifests in different ways; all to often it is for horse-flesh, but she has yet to succumb to the urges. She merely teases the idea, as one does an unrequited love; it makes her suffer, and the suffering is delicate and somehow pleasurable. Yes, Boudika would be a liar if she did not think of all the forms she could take to kill and consume. Yes, Boudika would be a liar if she were to ignore the way her muscles tremble with restraint and the saliva pools in long against her teeth and is then lost to the sea.
It is only when she is certain that she can control these urges does she emerge.
First, Boudika is a speck of red—her mane where it lashes in the froth of the waves when she surfaces, her head emerging from one long break of surf. She snorts out salt water and mist. Then, it is her bald face catching the glint of light from the clouds; she is whiter than white, stark as bone, where that uneven mask covers her crimson face.
Then, a shoulder—and two. Her striped haunches and a lashing, leonine tail. Boudika exits the waves in a thunder; the water sloughs off of her like a second skin. She cannot help but toss her head. She cannot help but buck and rear and then settle into an impassioned canter that slows only when she is near enough to speak.
She thinks, you were not alone.
Only a man who believes he is abandoned paces in such a way. Only a man who believes there is no witness.
Boudika does not bother with pleasantries.
“You’ve nearly worn a canyon into my shoreline.” Her voice comes out high and bright. Her mouth tilts into a smile; on anyone else’s face, it would have been friendly. On Boudika it splits her face in two with rows of shark’s teeth. “What troubles you?”
Once, Boudika would have said, this is a dangerous place to pace and think.
Once, Boudika would have warned, you should stay away from the sea.
Now Boudika thinks,
come closer, come closer.
The water horse trembles, and trembles, and it is the sea on her and behind her and the way the coastline always feels on the precipice of storm, of breaking. She stands at the war of worlds, where the sea meets the sand, where the ocean asks the land to concede and the land refuses. For now.
Come closer, come closer.
Oh, how she hungers. It is in the depth of her eyes. Boudika paces, back and forth, a shallow line in comparison to his track. She cannot stay still. Her socked legs dance against the sand; she tosses her head. The gulls continue to scream. Everything is movement. And he is dark like a shadow is dark. There is just enough storm in the air to make Boudika want to take him.
"Speech." || @
even gods, though they were born
in our own heads, died out to myth
