The Harper and The Sea

An Imtheus in world Myth

I sing so it may not be forgotten,
A tale reshaped by the hand of time.

For they say the singer still haunts these isles,
Though his song now differs from mine.

They say he walked upon the water,
And sang the waves his plea—
They say she gave him an ancient vow,

That old and wily sea.

Ah now that is done and good gods are listening, our song may go on to the tale at hand. But be warned dare you listen on, for this is a tale thick with the rush of destiny. We Culunoci know that pull, fate belongs to the sea and always has. The Mythrians and other folk to the west believe the sea god to be a warlike figure, an armoured dwarf filled with rage and tempest. But we know better. Aye… the sea is no warrior, she is a poet… and with a poet we begin.

There was a harper, a harper better, quicker and cleverer than all others that had ever graced the world's shores. Just as a truly good artist is meant to be, his true name is lost to the ages, for no great artist sings only of themselves. So we shall call him only The Harper.

He was a traveller of old and dark times and in his seeing of this dark he sought to weave an alternative. A path of pleasure to bring eyes up and fill hearts with hope. He wove a tale of pretty lies, a story that ever grew and adapted each time he played. Music and narrative combined in perfect harmony. So beautiful and intriguing was his story, so wonderful the world he made that people took to following him for days upon days, eager with each night of the epic to know how it might end.

The Harper did not tarry and The Harper did not hold back. He played his tale on and on, ever growing as the years rushed by until one day on one fateful night his finger missed a chord. This had never happened to The Harper and it shook him to his core. He knew then what all must learn one day, that death lurks on our shoulders. The gods had tried to kill death, so terrible was its power, but ending cannot be unending and so death today still stands.

The Harper was afeared, he needed more time to finish his tale and beyond that his heart was gripped with panic for what awaited on the other side. For all he had failed to do on this one. And so with harp in hand and upon a boat he went to meet with the sea herself.

Now I have already told you that we Culunoci know the sea for what she truly is. She is no hammer-wielding fighter with rage in heart, though indeed she can be wrathful, no. The sea is patient, steady and always in motion. She feeds the world and fills it with her ebbing tide. She is a poet and a wanderer and beloved by bards all over.

When The Harper came to meet her he played for her a song of his fear. His tears falling from his face and giving salt back to the waters of the world. She rose from the depths in answer, so moved she was by his gift, and stood before him upon the churning water. Her eyes were as pools of deepest depths. Her skin, the midnight black of a sea in the dark, when you cannot tell where water and sky meet or end. Where her legs would be instead emerged the body of a great sea beast conjoined to her waist and in her hands she held the driftwood club of tempest and conchshell horn of deep and known things.

At sight of her The Harper at once dropped his instrument and fell to his knees. His plea rang out all at once:
“Mistress, great goddess of churning water, I beg of you. I fear for my tale and my skill, I fear for the years passing and never finishing what I have begun.”

She looked down upon him, her eyes boring into the mortal below.
“Why does this surprise and shame you, human? All things die, this is the way of things.”

The Harper at once looked up at her, his eyes filled with hope.
“But not you, mine queen of brine and beauty, mistress of wave, storm and tide. You do not age or fear death. With the passing of the years the sea will always remain and forever be the same.”

The sea smiled, for in her heart she knew this to be a lie. She knew better than all the gods that there would come a time when she too would step into the blackness of eternity, when Death that betrayed god would turn on his children and eat them one by one before he too leapt into the unknown.

But as much as the sea knew this she could not fight her nature, she was a poet, a romanticist at heart, and the tale called to her onwards. To her great shame, she too wanted to hear its ending.

“You may ask this, mortal, and I will grant it. For long you have been a child of my art. Long have your words moved like water and stirred emotion as pleases me. But before you ask, consider it carefully, for this is a grave and terrible thing… to run from death.”

The Harper did not hesitate.
“I ask it anyway… my queen.”

“And so be it.”

And with her hand she ripped from her chest a glistening and bloody rib. Then from her hair she wove nine strong strings of rippling song. With these she made a harp like no other, and with great sorrow she gave it to The Harper.

He took it with wonder in his eyes and at once began to play. The most beautiful of all music he had ever composed rang out with the wildness of the tempest, struck heartstrings like waves upon high rock, and ripped emotions free with its swirling eddies. He moved to leave but the sea bound him with a warning, before she returned to those wine-dark depths.
“But know this,” she said, her words rippling with fate. “When your tale ends you must give back the harp and pass into the blackness of death. I urge you not to fight this, but know it as a certainty, and greet it as a friend. Goodbye, artist, I wish your story a good ending.”

The Harper returned to the land and continued his tale but soon found there was a curse upon him. He would not allow the story to end no matter how close it came, for he knew the final chord would come with his ending. Around him his listeners began to fade, age taking them and leaving The Harper behind. He fled ever onwards, now knowing the curse of which the sea had warned but unable to allow himself to face death as a friend.

They say he wanders Culunoc still. Harp in hand and playing his endless tale onwards, they say death walks at his heels never letting him rest or eat, and that his music is nothing more than the cordless thrum of a man on the run from his own fate. And yet the most terrible thing of all… without its ending his story was forgotten for all time, lost as if slipping below the depths.