Child of the Sea

Child of the Sea arrived on the island with no knowledge of who he was or where he'd been, and learned about sacred things until he questioned them and was driven to the Isle of Demons.

CHILD OF THE SEA



    The weight of his head slowly eased from the hot sand, small speckles glittering on his face as his eyes gazed upward.  He saw light, felt heat and heard noise.  His mind had just begun to grasp the reality of newly found safety  when a wave took him, rolling him yet again in cool and bitter water.  His body groped with new but strangely familiar sensations.

    He staggered to his feet, coughing and choking, swaying one way and another as he fought to escape the sea and rediscover balance.  His eyes, blurred by long exposure to sea and the sudden infusion of brilliant light, began to study shapes and features.  Nothing was familiar but the sensations of thirst, hunger, heat and despair.  Shielding his eyes against the piercing glare of the sun, he tried to spit the gritty sand from his lips without success.  His stomach rebelled in a nauseous chorus of complaints.

    Standing on weakened legs he cast his eyes upon the island before him.  Trees stood pompously beyond the sands of the beach, framed below by rocks and above by blue sky and soft clouds.  Palm fronds swayed to the rhythm of waves crashing at his back.  The island was alive, and in its breath he could feel life returning to his tired, battered body.  He turned to look from whence he’d come, and felt the tremors of impending doom that had so recently overwhelmed him.

    The ocean was a menacing unknown.  It challenged him, mocking his slim grasp at life, threatening to take him again in its own due time.  It was death, but it also contained life.  A life he could not live nor understand.  Above the foamy breaks another island stood, far in the distance.  Had he a means of travel over the treachery of the deep it wouldn’t be that far, but as it was it might have been another world.  Way beyond that island stood another, shrouded in the mists of distance, dancing in the play of the heat.  Too far.  Much too far.

    Thirst was his first concern, and as his limbs regained some of their strength he set off in search of drinkable water.  It would be inland, of course.  Water on the sandy beach would be soured by the deadly poison of the sea, so he went to the trees and immersed himself in their shade while he sought fresh drink.  After an hour of searching among the mammoth trees he stopped to rest, and when his breath returned he heard the faint sounds of water gurgling over stones somewhere ahead.  Not fifty paces farther he found it, a small stream of cool clean water, and dove to the bank with his face mere inches from life.

    His reflection stared back at him from the surface, and he paused before submersing himself.  The man he saw was vaguely familiar to him, yet still a stranger.  He didn’t dwell on the stranger long, plunging himself into the life-giving liquid until the need for air made him surface.  Once more he drank, then rested above the mirrored pool to regain himself, looking again to his reflection.  There was no recognition there, though he strained to remember.  No name came to mind, no memory of his past.  All he knew for certain was that he lived, that he had come from somewhere, had likely been bound for somewhere, and that there must be a reason for his presence on this unknown island.  He knew also that he needed food and water to exist.
    A third time he drank, then again looked at himself in the pool, only this time he was not alone.  Another face joined his, the face of another human.  He had no recollection of humans, but knew they would exist for he was of them.  It was a soft face, one filled with concern and compassion, and he turned from the brook to face him in gratitude.  “Help me” he whispered in a long unused voice.

    
    The Old One spent several minutes wracked in pain as the coughing spell swept over him, and Child of the Sea waited helplessly for it to subside.  He was called Child of the Sea for he knew no other name, and it was the sea that had brought him here.  They sat on a cliff overlooking the great depths from which Child of the Sea had so recently escaped, looking into the dark heavens.  In a bright burst of light a star fell from the heavens to the sea, dragging a reluctant tail with it to the death that waited in the murky waters.  Child of the Sea had seen stars die thus many times before, but never ceased to wonder at the gloriousness of it.  It was a peaceful night

    “The stars glitter in thine eyes” the Old One said, breaking the silence of the moment in his guttural tone.  “I’ve seen them in the eyes of others many times, and know your mind.  Ye seek answers to deep questions, dost thou not?”

    Child of the Sea gazed upon the Old One reverently, pausing to organize his words carefully.  This was the man who had become his family, who had saved him from certain death when he washed upon these shores, and had taught him all he knew about life and the ways of the gods.  “Old One, I owe you more than I can say.  You have taught me to hunt and fish, to take life from the sea of death.  You have taught me to build a shelter against the rain, to keep my fire safe from the forest, and to respect the nature of all things.  Above all you have taught me faith in the everlasting gods.  For all these things I am grateful, but there must be more.

    “When the sea of death disgorged me upon these shores I had knowledge, did I not?  Thus I deduce that I came from somewhere.  And it seems logical that the gods brought me here for a reason.  But I know not what that reason must be, nor from whence I came or to where I was bound.”

    The Old One stared at the stars in silence for a moment, then turned slowly to his pupil.  “Your questions do you justice, Child of the Sea, for ye ask of things that are weighty in the minds of men and not easily understood.  I will instruct you as I was instructed by him who went before me, and those before him back to the beginning.  And, in time, you will instruct those who are yet to come in the things I will teach you now.

    “Thou hast indeed come from somewhere.  A place wherein dwell the gods and their children.  In this place you had no knowledge of good and evil, nor a purpose.  For that you were sent to this world, and the knowledge you gain here will be used to build a strong home in the world to which you will go next.  When we depart this world we take only the faith we have sustained, and that becomes the foundation for the gaining of life never ending.”

    “Tell me more of the world in which we live” Child of the Sea asked.  “How large is it, and to where do its boundaries reach?”

    “It is bounded by the dark seas” the Old One replied, yet even as he spoke a dim light twinkled from the island Child of the Sea had noted his first day upon this world, which lay beyond the sea.

    “Is that another world, then?” he asked, pointing with a firm gesture toward the light that parted the darkness.

    “Look not upon that evil place” the Old One said with surprising intensity in his tone, his head turned away from the direction of the pointing finger, “nor think in your heart to take your fishing canoe there.  It is not a world of the living.  Only demons who have been expelled by the gods dwell there.  Make your home among the living, and amuse yourself not with idle thoughts of those who have been cast from the presence of the gods.”

    Child of the Sea took one last inquiring glance at the lights across the sea, wondering that demons should need lights to guide them in darkness, then honored the advice of his mentor.  Still, his mind sought to know more about that and other mysteries.  “Another question would I ask” he said in the softness of the night, “about the manner in which we build our homes.”

    “We build as the gods have instructed” the Old One replied, “as I have told you before.”

    “And yet the construction is weak and fragile” Child of the Sea returned.  “Twice already since my arrival in this world storms have swept away the homes of our people, who have had to rebuild.  Would it not be wiser to build sounder homes with foundations of stone?”

    “We build as the gods have instructed” the Old One repeated firmly.  “Do not think Their guidance futile, nor question that which comes from greater knowledge than yours.”

    “I question not in disbelief” Child of the Sea explained, “but to understand.”

    “Peril awaits those who must understand that which cannot be understood” the Old One cautioned.  “It is necessary only to place our faith in the gods, for which we are rewarded.”

    “I see no reward, Old One” Child of the Sea argued.  “I see only the constant rebuilding of homes that cannot take the abuse of the weather the gods send upon us.  Where is the wisdom in that?  Do the gods deem it necessary to punish us for our righteousness?”

    “What ye call wisdom is the sin of man.  True wisdom is found in placing your faith in the gods” the Old One said with finality, and then he burst into another fit of coughing.  He was dying.  Everyone in the village knew it, as did the Old One himself.  It was the will of the gods, for dying was a natural part of life.  Yet, Child of the Sea reflected, it was also the reward for the doing of evil deeds.  Why was it that those who lived righteously were punished in like manner as those who lived in wickedness?  Did people fall into evil as they advanced in age?  Surely this could not be.  The ignorance of youth was more apt to fall into deviltry than the wisdom of age, yet it was the aged who paid the price of wickedness.  Child of the Sea wondered upon this, but remained silent.

    The next day a storm again raged through the village, destroying the homes and killing an infant.  A period of mourning was held, and then the reconstruction began.  The Old One, having given shelter to Child of the Sea in his own home, decided it was time for him to build a home of his own.  Thus, Child of the Sea looked upon the place where his home was to be built, and down the canyon that funneled the winds to his selected spot, and decided to build a home that would withstand the storms.

    Where the gods dictated eight supporting poles he used sixteen, and buried them at full arm’s length rather than mid-forearm as taught by the gods.  Instead of packing the holes with dirt, he wedged large rocks around the poles to support them, then packed dirt around the rocks.  With other stones he built a foundation knee high that encompassed and reinforced the poles.  The villagers mocked him, for their homes were finished and providing shade and comfort while he continued to labor on his, but he paid them no heed.  The girders and crossbeams he secured with nine loops of binding fibre instead of the three demanded by the gods, and the thatching was three layers deep instead of two.

    After many days of labor and toil he finished, and began to live in his own home, which was unlike any of the others.  And then by night a storm swept in from the sea, and when the destruction was surveyed the next morning only the home of Child of the Sea remained standing.  This so enraged the villagers that they followed the Old One to see that justice was done and found Child of the Sea sleeping, as if the storm had not descended upon him.

    “Go from among us” the Old One shouted, “for surely you have brought the vengeance of the gods upon us.  Your disbelief and disobedience have brought this evil storm before its time, and only by your expulsion will we be redeemed.  Take your fishing canoe and go to the demon isle where you may unite with others of your ilk, for you have no place any longer in this world.”

    “Surely” Child of the Sea replied, “you must see that if I had angered the gods my home would be destroyed, yet it stands.  This is not the work of the gods but the random forces of the storms, which I have learned to conquer.  My knowledge will make life better for all of us.  There will be less sickness and dying, less suffering from exposure.”

    “If you do not go from among us, we will be forced to put an end to your life to cleanse ourselves of the evil you have brought” the Old One demanded.  So it was that Child of the Sea took with him a few coconuts for food and drink, and once again faced the dangers of the deadly sea.  He wanted not to go to the isle of demons, but as the only other island was too far away and his food reserves were limited, no other choice presented itself.  Shrugging in resignation, he guided his canoe toward certain death among the demons.



    “You wish to ask a question, Curious One?” the Master Teacher said in recognition of the one who had come to them from the dangers of the sea a few months before.  He who had been Child of the Sea was now called the Curious One, not because of his innate curiosity, but because his thoughts were curious in comparison to their own.

    “I do, Master Teacher” the Curious One acknowledged with a grateful bow for the audience he had been granted.  It was not common for students at his level to be given such an honor, but the Curious One was indeed a quick learner who had mastered much in the short time he had been among them.  “I would ask about the disease which has taken the Dean of Scholars, Master Teacher.  Is it serious?  Will he die?  Is he being punished for the commission of sins?  I have learned much of the healing arts and other meaningful things, but this I do not understand.”

    “I see that many of your old beliefs still linger with you” the Master Teacher sighed, but he was not displeased.  “Thus will I answer your questions honestly and scientifically, as is our way.  The Dean of Scholars is being punished, but for a lack of judgement rather than the commission of a sin.  He chose to lay with a maiden who has the illness of which you ask, but I assure you it is fully curable.  The Dean of Scholars will be fine.”

    “And the maiden?  Will she be cured as well?”

    “Of course, provided we learn which of them transferred the disease.  It is not a difficult disease to overcome, Curious One.”

    “Yet the disease thrives, and sometimes takes lives.  Why is that, if it is so easily cured?”

    “Because the maidens who carry the disease show no symptoms, Curious One.  Therefore they do not know they are carriers, or that the disease is within them, and seek not the cure.  In addition, it modifies itself over time so that new cures must be developed.”

    “And maidens who are not cured continue to spread it?”

    “This is true” the Master Teacher nodded gravely.  “I myself have fallen victim to it twice.  How is it that after this long among us you have not required the cure?”

    “I do not lay with maidens, Master Teacher, for it is an abomination in the eyes of the gods who spared me from certain death at the hands of the sea.  Until I marry a maiden my body will not know hers, and then we will know only each other.”

    “That is a preposterous concept, Curious One, based on ancient beliefs in gods who do not exist.  Do you doubt that a society built upon the precepts of science such as ours would fail to investigate the existence of such beings?  We found no evidence to support these beliefs.  None at all.”

    “You have no evidence to support the existence of joy or sorrow either, Master Teacher, yet surely you admit to their realities.  Even the cause of life is a mystery to you, yet no one would deny it exists.  Surely you must admit that research has not yet revealed all the answers.  I have a true and abiding faith in the gods, whether they be proven true or no.  I know what is within my soul, and it harms me not.  I need fear no disease from it, for it is as pure as I strive to be, and in this assurance I shall continue to keep that faith.”

    “But to deny yourself the pleasures of our maidens is a price too high for mortal man to pay” the Master Teacher objected.  “It is not the nature of man to restrict himself to the pleasures of one woman.  Nature, with all her power, bows before the majesty of scientific principals, which are the only true gods.  And these gods require no abstinence from pleasure, as do the angry gods of your beliefs.”

    “The disease which ravages your people would seem evidence to the contrary, Master Teacher” the Curious One pointed out meekly.  “You have the means to cure the disease, yet it continues to spread and mutate.  One day it will turn into something you can no longer cure.”

    “All diseases can be cured” the Master Teacher retorted proudly.  “It is only a matter of finding the correct potion.”

    “I have seen a diseased one” the Curious One commented thoughtfully, “who suffers greatly from spells of intense coughing.  Is this a curable disease?”

    “Of course it is” the Master Teacher gloated.  “A simple potion taken daily for ten days and as long in bed, and he who is sick will be whole again.  Bring the sufferer to me, and I will see that he is restored to health.”

    “It would be best, Master Teacher, if I took the potion to him instead.”

    “Then it shall be yours on the morrow.  There, you see that we accommodate all who are sick, even those who do not seek help of their own accord.”

    “You are truly masters in the arts of healing” Curious One replied, “but would it not be wiser to prevent the disease before the cure became necessary?  If the advice of the gods were adhered to, and each man and maiden lay with only a chosen mate, this disease could be eliminated entirely.”

    “What you suggest is to violate the very nature of the human animal” the Master Teacher exploded loudly.

    “What I suggest is the elevation of the human beyond the animal” the Curious One countered, then left without another word.  His mind was in a turmoil from which there could be no peace, for he now realized that he had been both blessed and cursed since his near fatal encounter with the sea.

    Among the people of the Old One he had learned the importance of faith and belief, yet those people violently refused to understand even the most basic things about the nature which surrounded them.  In that state, therefore, they would be victimized by every storm and physical malady, for the gods had chosen through the centuries not to spare them from death and violent destruction.  The gods were real.  Of that the Curious One, who had once been Child of the Sea, was certain.  His faith attested to it.  But they were quiet gods, perhaps even absent gods, for the state of man had not changed despite all his faith.  If only faith could be coupled with the knowledge research provided.

    The people of the isle of demons fared no better, despite all their scientific research.  They had learned to overcome many of the laws of nature, but their own desires were beyond control.  If only the Isle of Demons could learn from the people of the Old One.  At least enough to take from them the best and most enduring truths.  And if only the Old One could see that he could master the storms and heal the sick without sacrificing his faith.  If they could do that, wouldn’t both be better than they were?

    Understanding what he must do, the Curious One began to write a treatise on the most important things he had learned from the Old One.  When it was complete he distributed it among the people on the Isle of Demons, who were not in reality demons.  But the people rose up against him and he was cast again into the sea on his fishing canoe.  Taking with him the potion which would cure the Old One, he once again paddled toward the island upon which he had first arrived.



    The home he had built so carefully was gone, reduced to a pile of ashes.  The villagers had tried to tear it down, but the construction was too solid, so they were forced to burn it.  Motherly One met him as he crested the hill and entered the village.  “The Old One cast you from our midst” she reminded him vehemently, “and now he is on his death bed.  I do not think your return will gladden his last days of life.”

    “I have brought a potion that will restore him to health” the one-time Child of the Sea explained.  “You must let me take it to him, for I can give him life once again.”

    The wife of the Old One pierced him with her gaze, and in her eyes Child of the Sea recognized a mixture of disbelief and a desire to save her husband.  “Your demon potions will not work here” she shrugged, her eyes still searching his for a reason to believe, “but I will take you to him.  The decision must be his, for it is he who is dying.”

    Old One scowled when he saw the one-time Child of the Sea, and then he was wracked with a fit of coughing much worse than those he’d had when teaching his pupil the ways of the gods.  “You were cast out” he managed to whisper in a hoarse voice when his breath returned, “yet you have returned.  Why is this?”

    “I have brought a potion that can restore your health, Old One.  With it you will live many more years and teach many more people the things you taught me.”

    “I taught you nothing” the Old One said, spitting the words in disgust.  “You have no faith, and therefore the things I taught had no meaning to you.  Now another will take my place, and it will be up to him to succeed where I failed.”

    “You taught me more than you know” Child of the Sea retorted, also in anger.  “To you I have no faith, and therefore I am not capable of learning what you would teach.  And to the Master Teacher on the Isle of Demons - which harbors no demons - I have too much faith to be teachable.  Yet I have learned from both of you, and now it is I who will teach.  The truth is in your teachings, Old One.  And it is in the teachings of the Master Teacher.  But his people die for lack of faith, and yours die for lack of research.  To achieve true wisdom, you must combine that which you have to that which he has, and in that day both peoples will be truly blessed.”

    “Be gone from my sight” the Old One said in anger, “for it is blasphemy to suggest that we would part with a single precious word of the teachings we have.  And to blend them with those of the demons?  It shall not happen.  Not in a thousand years.”

    “Then I will go back to the sea from which I came” Child of the Sea replied in dignity, “for you and your people are already dead, condemned by the self-same beliefs that you think give you life.  And the people on the Isle of Demons are dead also, for they understand not the simplest of truths you could share with them.  Farewell, my friend.  May your death be swift and painless.  And may it be eternal, for the hope of mankind rests on the shoulders of others more receptive to wisdom than are you.”

    Back to the sea went the Child of the Sea, who had also been the Curious One.  Away from the island of the Old One he guided his fishing canoe, nor did he stop at the Isle of Demons.  To that far off island he went, and with him he took all the teachings he had been given in all things.  The teachings of faith in the gods and those of remedies and cures, and set out to start a world of his own.  A world in which wisdom would be prized.



    Many generations had passed when a pilgrimage from the far island came to see the holy islands upon which their revered forefather, Teacher From the Sea, had gained his incredible knowledge.  He had taught much during his long and prosperous life, and now that he was gone they wished to see those hallowed isles whereon his wisdom had been gained.

    When they reached the Isle of Demons, they found therein a few remains of what had once been a civilization, long since fallen into ruin and lifeless.  The reason for the demise of the civilization was unknown, and the pilgrims marveled at such loss.  This was where Teacher From the Sea, their progenitor, had gained his knowledge of cures for physical ailments and the science of all things, which had caused the pilgrims to prosper.  Surely, having had such knowledge, the former inhabitants of this island should have continued to thrive, yet they were gone into the dust many years hence.  What could have brought about such a disaster?

    Across the sea the other island was explored, and at the site where a village had once flourished only a few fire pits remained to mark its existence.  The faith in the gods, which was part of the fulness of the pilgrim’s lives, had not saved these people, for none now remained.  Among the ruins was found the charred remains of what had once been a strong, life-supporting home built on a stone foundation.  The pilgrims marveled at the construction of it, for it was built on the same precepts upon which their own sturdy homes were built.  Of all that had once been in the village, only the charred remains of that one home had survived the ravages of time and tempest.

    It alone stood as mute notice that wisdom had once resided there.

Author's Note

Hope you find something in this story worth the time spent reading.