Fruit of the Sea

This Week’s Prompt: 126. Castaways on island eat unknown vegetation and become strangely transformed.

The Resulting Story: Baqi and the Golden Fruit

This weeks prompt points to a very classical inspiration—that of the witch Circe and Odysseus’s crew.  While Odysseus was sailing back to Ithaca, his ship came ashore on Circe’s land. She invited the crew to a feast, offering them many dishes. And after partaking, the crew are transformed into pigs while still possessing the souls of men. Now, the prompt refers merely to “vegetation”—unknown vegetation at that. This implies an intended raw food experience, instead of the intentional preparation of the meal. So we’ll be an examining both here, when feasts and food cause a transformation.

The Circe Episode is not the only episode of the Odyssey that comes to mind.  There is also the Lotus Eaters, an island where eating lotus’s causes forgetfulness and bliss. This is an island that Odysseus must drag his crew away from, in order to continue going home. This image has become exceptionally common in stories ever since, with places that lure in the trouble with promises of forgetting their cares and responsibilities only to consume them being a particularly common trope.

There are other consumptive plants. Hungry grass, for instance, occurs in parts of Ireland. This grass does not just consume persons—rather, they ensure whoever steps on them becomes hungry for the rest of their lives. These plants would bring about strange transformation, certainly—at least one author has suggested the stories began during times of famine.

Other stories of island plants include the legends of the coco de mer. This nut has an…unusual shape, and a few unusual stories. A particularly common one is that they are actually grown under the sea, on great trees that sometimes rise to catch boats. When the trees catch the boats, a great bird emerges to devour the sailors and ships.  This creature was sometimes referred to as a garuda, a terrifying bird that has other mythic roots we discuss here. The trees are so large they even rise above the water with their branches, and the area around these trees pulled at ships as they passed. Sadly, I can’t dig much into this particular form—the only source I could find on it is a newspaper article from 1906.

Of course, strange foods transforming the eater are not limited to witches. We have, for instance, the food that binds the seasons in Greek Mythology. For those unfamiliar, Persephone was wandering out in the fields when Hades erupted from the earth in a chariot and kidnapped her, at the suggestion of his brother Zeus. After this, her mother could not find her—and grew inconsolable, refusing to allow the green of the world to grow. This became unbearable, however, and so Persephone was sent back to the world by her husband—but not before eating six pomegranate seeds, ensuring that she would remain below for six months. And thus the seasonal shift from spring to winter is established.

Now eating the food of the dead or the underworld often has strange effects. We read last time of an undersea land in Donegal Bay where eating the food would trap one among the fae for all time, and it is hardly alone. Off the shores of Bofin there lives a very lovely fae who will kidnap beautiful girls, and if they eat food while held in his castle they are prisoners until the end of time.  Another place, illuminated by rainbows and suns, bound its prisoners for seven years—and nearly overcame it’s hero, when a woman flew from Donegal bay to save him.

The dead in the Philippines, the ghouls, also have a tendency to share their food. By this means, they turn others into ghouls—a process of spread cannibalism that we discussed more here.  These creatures of course are kept at bay by other foods, and we discussed more of the aswang here.

Moving from the land of the dead, there is of course the eating of food at the beginning of things. The most obvious story—one that lacks a sailor but was transformative—is the Garden of Eden myth. The actual result of the eating of those fruits varies.  One of my preferred versions is the change in shape from the first couple—the loss of sharp, horn-like skin and a cloud of glory that covered their forms. Adam shrunk from being as tall as the heavens to merely being three hundred and seventy-five feet. The serpent went from king of animals, upright like humans and capable of finding all manner of wonderous stones, to the lowly and cursed creature we know today, the moon was darkened, and all manner of cosmic changes occurred.

While not exactly the same, there is a story of misfortune on a cosmic scale, brought on by feasting. This comes from Maori stories. Here Maui fished up the first of the islands, having grown tired of living conditions on the open sea. He instructed his brothers to not eat any of the food on the island until he returned—and yet like Odysseus’s crew they proved incapable of listening to basic orders. As a result, the perfect island was distorted—great mountains rising from the ground and land becoming rough. Such is sadly the way of the world.

There are other strange plants to consider. There is the Zaqquam, the devil tree, who’s fruit resembles devil heads. Those that partake in this fruit, often sinners, have their flesh ripped off and their bodily fluids spilled out. Others have their stomachs boil, while others suggest that the tree itself is grown from the seeds of evil deeds.

Further afield there are the Golden Apples of the Hesperides. The exact nature of these nymph tended and dragon guarded apples varies—they  are attributed as being both the apples that distracted Atlanta and the source of Eris’s apple of discord. These apples were given to Hera, in many legends, as a marriage gift by Gaia herself and planted near where the sunsets.

The apples of course remained there for most of history, stolen supposedly only twice—by Hercules and Perseus. They were deployed in other myths, but where inevitably returned to the island even after the dragon Ladon was slain. I haven’t found other stories that follow the strange island, but they presumably still remain there at the Western edge of the world.

Setting aside the cosmological for a moment, many of these islands not only  have strange fruit, but fruit that traps those who consume it. Whether as a metaphor for the dangers of luxury on a journey, distracting from the actual end goal, or as the dangers of losing your connections to your home while travelling long distances—in case we forget, food is what brings people together in many places—the fruit ties those who eat it to where they acquired it.  

The fear of becoming someone different in your travels—worse, of a wanderer becoming hostile and strange to those they love—is at first glance a rather conservative fear. However, I think it’s roots are not in xenophobia perse, but in the fear of loss of identity. Certainly, being changed by new experiences, especially travel (as rare as it is in current conditions) is overall for the better. But at the same time, it is becoming something unknown, other, and unfamiliar. It is becoming in away a part of the places you see.

Of course on the other hand there is some simple B-Movie fun in a castaway story where the local fauna or flora in this case are more than they seem. That alone is a horrifying idea, and the idea of being overtake by moss and fungus and other decaying horrific things is enough to write a story on.

What stories have you heard about the food of the sea? The fruit of the sea? Besides seafood, of course, which we have in abundance.

Bibliography

“Most Famous of All Palms Coco de Mer” (PDF). New York Times. January 28, 1906. Retrieved 2010-04-28.

Grey, George. Polynesian Mythology, and Ancient Traditional History of the Maori. Whitcombe & Tombs, 1974.

Westropp, T. J. “A Study of Folklore on the Coasts of Connacht, Ireland (Continued).” Folklore, vol. 32, no. 2, 1921, pp. 101–123. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1255238. Accessed 19 Feb. 2021.

The Sacred Fish

This Week’s Prompt: 60. Fisherman casts his net into the sea by moonlight—what he finds.

The Prior Research:Dredged Up From The Depths

The fisherman of the western cliff face, far from the city of Kahal, lived entirely at the mercy and providence of the primeval mother sea. On it’s black waves, as the moon glimmered down, a passing stranger would find one of the small ships sailing along the cliffs and coves, dragging the net behind. Old Ichabod kept his ship out late that night, searching for fertile waters. His ship was slow, his nets were poor. His wife Sarah had held their home, by carving the other fish and making clothes to sell. So tonight, he sailed past his normal waters, off towards the shores marked by crumbling pillars.

During the day he would not be so daring. For reasons long forgot, the village did not fish in the bay where old spiraling coral rose as long lost gate posts. But such protected paradises become rich for desperate plunder. The waves were strong at the coral edge, and most canny fisherman avoided the bay for those dangers alone. Ichabod, however, moved between them with ease. He dragged his nets along that shallow floor, looking to bring fish that had never seen such a boat. And shortly after, his nets grew heavy.

Pulling them over, he found them thick with a pulsing white mass of fish. They were strange, squirming, wretched things. Their skin was smooth to the glance but sharp to the touch. They had no eyes, and no teeth in their mewling mouths. Their fatty, fleshy bodys struggled feebly against the air. But their bodies, as life left them, smelled like honey and their blood was like olive oil. Despite having never seen such things,Ichabod reasoned that such a haul was worth returning with, and the fish worth at least a taste.

Icahbod slipped back home in silence, returning home to a confused wife. He took one of the fish inside and carved it, and cooked it in the pan. A bit of fat flickered off it’s goldening meat and onto his thumb. He took a quick taste, and found the substance tasted sweet and succulent. The finished fish was filling, the best the couple had ever consumed.

They were less delighted and more deeply confused when the next day, Sarah found herself sick in the morning. The two went to a wise woman, who confirmed their suspicion. Sarah was pregenant. The two were both delighted and confused. They hadn’t lain with each other in some time. Ichabod grew wrothful, suspicious that some more fortunate fisherman had visited his wife. But her pleading convinced him she had been faithful. Strange as it seemed, the two concluded the fish were to blame.

The bounty of fish, cooked to delight, brought them some fame in the day as well. And, full of daring, Ichabod made the trip again and again, growing rich off the sweet tasting blind fish. It’s effects became known, as many women was with child in a few weeks, and the village hungered for more of the strange fish.

Other sailors began to wonder where Ichabod got his fish, unseen elsewhere in the ocean. A few tried to follow him at night, but Ichabod was wise to them and refused to sail to his hiding spot until he was sure he was alone. The fish he ate restored him every day, as if he’d never slept.

But one of the farmers, a younger boy Obed, snuck aboard Ichabod’s ship one night, hiding in the cabin as the fisherman left the shore. And by moonlight, through the door, he saw Ichabod breach that taboo bay. He was so startled he let out a squeal, revealing himself to the old fisher man’s wide pupiled eyes. Icahbod had the boy over the edge in moments, dangling by his shirt.

The boy quickly offered to help Ichabod catch even more of the fish, saying that with two ships, they’d both make four times the profit, helping each other carry more of the load back. And Ichabod considered, and agreed, for substantially more of the profit than a mere half. Given his precarious position, the boy agreed.

So the fish poured in greater numbers, their mewling and whining stifled by the flames and ever hungry populace. Eventually, Ichabod hit upon a better idea. He and the boy went and rebuilt the old tower near the bay and built a crude gate. Coming to town, he explained that he would allow any to fish from his hidden bay for a fee.

At first there were threats of violence, but by then Ichabod had grown large from his diet. His skin was growing gold, and his hands had become webbed. Small growths had appeared within his mouth, barely visible but he felt them when he ate. It made eating much hard, but the small growths massaged the soft flesh of the fish well, refining there flavor and picking bones clean, saving him the bother of cleaning the fish. Some even said he at them live. In the last three months, he’d grown a foot in height. The boy, in his fishing and abundance of the fish he had, was up to his shoulder and had small teeth running on the top of his mouth. The two of them had nothing to fear of violence. So the village relented.

It became common to spend nights in the bay, catching fish and eating them on the shore, before retiring home in the morning, to tend to wives and trade with sea born merchants, who found the changes startling. Men and women and children no longer ate grains, but devorued fruit and raw flesh. Their skin was paleand scaled, their arms lengthy. Ichabod allowed traders to ply their wares, but prohibited them enter his bay, erecting barricades around his tower and piling stones to hurl at vessels. He and his wife rarely left their tower, sending the fishing boys to do his biding from the shore.

But even this was tiresome. In time, the village moved into the bay entirely. They caught the fish with their hands, no longer bothering with nets. They had boats, but swimming in it’s inky deep was a common pastime. And, at last, the children were born.

They were pale mewling things, with eye lids too heavy to open, and skin that was soft to look at but sharp to the touch. Their hands had small claws, and their mouths had loathsome tendrils, perfect for catching fish and the deeper things of that by gone bay, the things that had lurked so long ago in sacred waters long forgotten. And so the people of the western shore were known as far as distant Kahal.

---

That ends this weeks tale. I had a busy week, so didn’t have the chance to review and rework this as much as normal. I like the general premise, and I think some horror of what you consume could be played with. A longer time scope would also serve the story: gradual mutation after eating unknown substances is ripe for material.

Next week: a pilgrimage to a demon throne!

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.

Dredged Up From The Depths

This Week’s Prompt: 60. Fisherman casts his net into the sea by moonlight—what he finds.
The Resulting Story: The Sacred Fish

We’ll need a bigger boat for what can be dragged up with this corpse. Ignoring the moonlight for a moment, fisherman have a habit of finding strange things, from the medeterrain to Japan, and everywhere in between. If we put on our symbolic lenses, the reason might be apparent. The sea is a chaos and potent place. It is where anything can happen. And so, sometimes, everything happens.

A common fisherman catch is, unsurprisingly, fish. However, strange and rare fish are easy to find. A tale from Albania tells of a golden fish, which when caught and prepared, made a woman and a horse pregnant. Both children had a star on their brow, and go on to be fantastic heroes, marrying a shape-shifting gender bending moor and a djinn woman, blinding armies with their star-marked brows, and eventually confronting the treacherous king. In Japan, a species of mermaid if caught and eaten provides immortality but misfortune. Probably because of it’s all too human looking face. In Ireland, the Salmon of Wisdom provides…well, wisdom if eaten properly.

A German tale, recorded by the Brother’s Grimm includes a fish that grants wishes for it’s freedom in much the same way a genie might. An older version has the Yugoslavia version, where the fish gets caught so many times it accepts its fate and instructs him to cut it into six pieces, giving two to his wife and two to his horse and burying two in the ground after granting him a castle and gold. The result is two golden boys, two golden foals, and two golden lilies. A Greek version changes it to trees. The one brother goes out to make his fortune, the other stays at home. The adventuring brother pretends to be a robber and woos a maiden, and gets married. Then, he goes to hunt a stag and asked a witch for direction. The witch claimed to know where the stag was, but turned the man to stone. The other golden child came to rescue him and had his dog eat the witch up.

Fish also have a knack for swallowing important things. Solomon once lost his ring to a fish, and with it control over his kingdom, which was destroyed bit by bit as he was helpless to watch. Another fish swallowed a wish granting treasure(the nature of the item is not specified in my translation of the Tibtean tales). While not swallowing it, a fish does guard the sword of Wild Edric who we covered last week.

Ainu stories, recorded granted over a century ago, include the notion of fish that contain magical properties and must be proprieties after they are caught. They share this notion with the Netsilik of Northern America. Further, fish caught may belong to a creature recorded as Konoto-ran-guru, and must be returned. A creature lurking in the middle of the sea, given to him is power over all sea devils and ill currents. He prefers his subjects, the malformed fish of the sea, be returned to him.

More malicous creatures arise from the sea of course. In the Maori story of Tawaki, a race of amphibous creatures kidnap and enslave the heroes mother, spending most of their time in the sea, and sleeping on land. When dawn comes, they must return to the sea or they will die. Tawaki slays them by decieving them about the time, with help from his captive mother.

And then there are the objects that are dredged up from the sea! In another story relating to King Solomon, a bottle containing a djinn is tossed into the sea and fished up later. The poor fisherman who dragged that up died of fright when the djinn emerged. This occurred in the City of Brass story mentioned last week as well, where it was a rather regular occurrence (funnily enough, those djinn thought Solomon still lived).

Maui, that great Polynesian super man, washed onto the shore after his mother tossed him out. He, a fisherman in his own time, brought forth the arch-typical island from the sea on a fishing trip after his wives bothered him about his lack of fishing. He warned his brothers not to eat anything on the island, and not to disturb the island. Had his brothers not disturbed it, all islands would be perfect. But they did, and the island shook irritably, generating mountain ridges. It was a titantic and terrifying effort, ruined by a bit of carelessness.

Comparable, at least in part, to the fishing trip of Thor, where the thunder god nearly lifted up his own doom, the Jomundur serpent. The fishing expedition was one of frightful experiences for the giant involved, to say the least, who then tried to kill Thor and of course failed.

Then there are the things from the sea that come of their own accord. The sea has an odd tendency towards spirituality! First there are the sages of Mesoptamian myth, who rise from the fresh water of Abzu, bringing law and culture with them to human kind. These fish-like sages further saved humanity from the flood, before being banished back to Abzu by Marduk. Japan features the prophetic Amabie who can see when bloody war is coming.

Then there are those strange monks and bishops in Europe. The Sea Bishop was reported in Poland in the 16^th century, and was held captive by it’s king for many days. After a time, however, a visiting Bishop came across the creature, and it managed to communicate it’s want for freedom. The bishops released it and, before going below, it made the sign of the cross. Another was captured in Germany, but died fasting for three days and three nights.

The washing up of strange creatures, such as whales and giant squid, sometimes unearth terrible things in the real world. The sea, chaotic thing that it is, spits forth monstrous things every now and then onto the shore. And sometimes with horrific consequences (such as when a number of people learned not to dynamite a whale carcass, video here).

Of course, this mythology is reinforced by the reality that happens with shocking frequency. Fisherman pull up strange and bizarre catches, which make their way into museums or conspiracy theories. From ancient remains to modern technology, the sea holds many wonders strange and bizzare hostages. Again from Japan, there is a strange craft with a woman and a small box, which fishermen found in the early 19^th century. They deduced that the woman was an exile from a foreign land, and as her health was failing, they returned her to her reconstructed craft and set her to sea again.

A fascinating horror story, of things washing a shore from the depths of the seas, can be found in the story The Thing that Drifted Ashore, a short horror comic that I found here. It has some interesting notions that are often found with the sea: dreams, the dead, tragedy, and horror. I won’t spoil it here, but Junji Ito is an artist and writer that you should make a point to check out.

Our own story will no doubt begin with the discovery of the strange and sequestered item from the sea. The item or fish will have some mystifying effect, transforming the community that finds it in some subversive or disturbing way. And then it will be discovered, and perhaps suffer Innsmouth’s fate. Or alternatively, we will end with some ultimate horrific and tragic act.

Batchelor, John. Ainujin Oyobi Sono Setsuwa. KyōBunkan, 1901.

Chopel, Norbu. Folktales of Tibet. Ltwa, 2006.

Elsie, Robert William. A Dictionary of Albanian Religion, Mythology and Folk Culture. New York University Press, 2001.

Grey, George. Polynesian Mythology, and Ancient Traditional History of the Maori. Whitcombe & Tombs, 1974.

Megas, Georgios A. Folktales of Greece. P, 1970.

Sikes, Wirt. British Goblins: Welsh Folk-Lore, Fairy Mythology, Legends and Traditions. James R Osgood and Company, 1881.

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.

The Wind Blew Out From Bergen

This Week’s Prompt:57. Sailing or rowing on lake in moonlight—sailing into invisibility.

The Research:Sailing Away

I sat on the great cliffs of Moher, staring off into the fading sea. I’d come in quiet contemplation of all that I knew, facing into the inevitable turning of the tides. The moon was large that night, casting a great pale shadow on an otherwise dark sea. It looked, from those great cliffs, that the world ended just on the horizon. Or rather, that it wrapped itself upward again, so that the moon in the sky was as much a reflection as the one on the sea. In a moment, I thought, the sky will churn like the sea, and the moon will be rent to pieces.

It lasted all of a moment, my apocalyptic thoughts. In the next, the caw of a raven restored a sense of present. The cliffs were solid stone, and I sat with legs over the edge looking below. All was quiet, except the washing of the waves. All was still, despite the churning of the sea.

That was, until a curious sight caught my attention. It came up from the northern shore, first as a gentle cold breeze. Turning up, I saw the ripples on the water spilling onto the sea from some unseen source. At last, into view, came a vast sailing ship. Fog was round it’s sails, and flickers of lanterns lined it’s hull. Three sails full of wind pushed it on, but below I made out the motions of oars. It was as if a modern Englishmen had placed his hull on a ship of antiquity.

It recalled to mind, though, not the dread iron clads of this modern age. It was a wooden ship, moving at full sail. From afar, by some strange focus or unknown providence, I could still make out each hand and every sailor. My heart paused. For there, gambling on the deck, was Henry in his prime, his chest unmarred. No blood dripped on his uniform, obscured by royal red. His face seemed healed, both eyes still good and joy springing along his face.

And there, beside him, was William, drunk and laughing at some obscenity unspoken, waving his bottle like a cutlass. Recounting some half remembered story, of the Caribbean and pirates and smugglers and women. I leaned close, shocked further to see more of them. Brenard, reminiscing over the edge, laughing with Thomas. Robert had found William and the two were in each other’s grips. Oh, they all looked so young and well. Their skin was flush with color, no longer the pale and bloated things that floated to the surface of a stained sea.

More figures came into view. A crowd of Frenchmen here, a fallen German sailor there, a captain with fire in his beard, women and men alike. A strong man from the islands shared a pipe with a Frenchmen who, I sense, he may have beheaded. All seemed well. All was merry, there was drinking and dancing and revelry. Eventually I focused on the most peculiar figure. At the great wheel, he stood over six feet tall with skin the color of sea weed and hair as red as fire. Wildly he spun the ship’s wheel, and yet the ship stayed steady. Every now and then he would shout out a song, and half the crew would take up this shanty or another, a symphony of languages to the same tune.

But stranger still than that man was the thing that emerged from the captain’s cabin. A towering figure, with a single red eye, beneath a man of hair and above a beard that seemed to large to belong to a man. Like a large crab, with a wide brimmed hat dripping jewels, he stood surveying. And then fixed his eye on me.

Reaching a gloved hand out, I felt his gesture calling to me. All of them, beckoning me as their ship began to go farther out to sea, shimmering in the breeze. Wordless sirens, they sang to my heart, already wounded. The promised calm seas and celebration, and green hills and isles of gold. I jumped out of my shoes, flew out of my body onto it’s warm deck. I was young again, my stomach full of fire and laughter as I stood upon the floor, music filling the air. Their singing my song, the band invisible is playing my rhythm, and Delilah is there waiting for a dance.

I mumble and try and to take a step forward. But something has caught my leg. I pull harder, as the ship beneath me is pulling away. As the rail hits my back, I cry out for them not to leave me, that I am soon coming. The crew don’t hear me as they fade away.

Again on the misty cliffs of Moher I sit, alone on darkened stones, staring into the pale sea. The black waters below smash with little fanfare along the shore and cliff face, leaving small traces of salt in open wounds along the rock. I get up, and turn to walk away. But somethings still fastened, lightly, to my leg. Looking down I see it fade. A pale white hand, back into the stones, lets me go at last as I head back to the road.

 

———–

I’m not terribly fond of this one. The hook of alluring memories of younger days occured to me two days before it was finished, and I don’t feel like I had the time or creativity to extend it longer than it was. It feels like a small scene in a larger story, which might be a good place for it. I am oddly fond of my illustrations this time though.

Next week, we stay in the British Isles to discuss a peculiar valley!

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.

Sailing Away

This Week’s Prompt :57. Sailing or rowing on lake in moonlight—sailing into invisibility.
The Resulting Story: The Wind Blew Out From Bergen

Moonlight and invisibility are strong themes of these last few prompts. If I had the money to acquire a copy of Mr. Lovecraft’s letters, I’d wonder what possibly prompted this set of thinking or line of inquiry. As it is, we will press on. This prompt does have the benefit of being distinct from those before in at least one respect. The invisible no longer haunts us, nor is it revealed. Rather, we see the visible become invisible.

The beginning notion of sailing or rowing into invisibility, being lost to the sight of humanity, has some interesting parallels in the border space of folklore and urban legend. The basic premise is not too strange. After all, the sea is full of strange monsters, of sirens calling out to drown men, of ancient rebels against the gods, and more. But disappearances at sea? Those are old.

The most famous disappearance locale for American’s is actually far more recent then you might suspect. The Bermuda Triangle’s record only begins in the 1950s. But if there is a place more synonymous with “lost at sea” in the modern day, I’ve not heard of it. The triangle has it’s points at Bermuda, Florida, and Puerto Rico. It’s reputation of consuming ships is famed enough that I will stop here to say that in all likelihood, the probable cause is the sheer number of ships traveling those waves.

The related Devil’s Triangle in Japan is another recent notion of seas that enjoy sinking ships. It too has only been reported in the early 1950s, as has the notion of twelve of these paranormal vortices. While no doubt these can be sources of inspiration, their newness ought to be remembered.

Even ignoring these paranormal sightings, sailing to the land invisible is not so unusual. Odysseus did so, and found even stranger lands in the journey there. And funeral barges of Vikings and Egyptians alike were supposed to go on to the dead. King Arthur was sent out sailing to an unseen land, attended by three women. Like wise Väinämöinen built a ship of copper, with an iron bottom, to leave the land and sail to the heavens, out of the mortal(visible) world. Quetzacouatl left the realm of the living, in some versions, on a barge or boat of snakes! Such are the strange contraptions needed to reach the heavens.

But outside the realm of myth, folktales from various places talk of the dead as invisible sailors. Near Brittany, some report the dead are gathered in great invisible boats to be taken to the Isle of the Dead. On the Breton coastline, skiffs come out manned by the invisible dead. This is typically an ill omen. A German folktale reports that these dead voyages can do what is implied by the prompt, and fly towards the moon. Rabbi Amram asked, reportedly, to be placed in a coffin and allowed to flow wherever the river took him. The coffin, much to the world’s surprise, floated up the river!

And if it is rending ships invisible by their sinking, then the Devil must have his due. Multiple demonic forces or malicious spirits are thought to sink ships when angered or displeased. The devil himself was once sighted at sea with a sword in hand. Other times, demons take the crew themselves!

“The devil, according to a story from Schleswig-Holstein,still ferries people across Cuxhaven bay. He does this to liberate himself from the consequences of a certain compact.He had procured a ship for a certain captain, the latter to yield himself up with the ship, which was to be kept busy so long as there was a cargo. This Satan tried to find, so as to keep the vessel cruising until the compact expired, but the was outwitted at the end of the first cruise by the captain’s son, who crowded sail on and let the anchor go. The fiend tried to hold the anchor, but went overboard with it.” Reports Fletcher Basset, citing an older text (Schmidt-Seeman Sagen, which I did not have time to check).

We then can consider also those ships that are now invisible, having made the journey. The Flying Dutchman, who made a deal with devil long ago and now serves as a sort of sea-bound Wild Hunt, has been mentioned before. But let us look at him at length. The Flying Dutchman is a man-of-war, a terrifyingly vast warship that emerges from the storm to assault ships as bad weather strikes. Another name for the ship is Carmilhan, with the goblin Klabotermen as it’s pilot. The ship has no crew except invisible ghosts, no sails but rags, and hounds ships to the end of the earth. Other times, the ship is a former slave-ship, which was struck by the tragedy of the plauge.

Related is Falkenberg, who sails the world and played dice for his soul with the devil. In some cases, Falkenberg is the Dutchman himself.

One amusing tale tells of a group of pirates that, in the stylings of Scooby Doo, pretend to be the Flying Dutchman, only to be assailed by the real thing. As the storm blows in, the demon ship is unflatered by it’s rival and engages in combat. The results are sadly one sided, as the demon ship lays them to waste with ease.

But the Flying Dutchman is not the strangest of it’s kind. There is still the Bewiched Canoe. Yes, a magically canoe. From French Canada comes the story of a huntsman who so enjoyed the hunt, he made a pact with the devil to continue it forever. Not only is he in a canoe, but the canoe flies through the air.

Larger than these, is the ship Chasse Foudre, a French vessel that takes seven years to tack. It is so vast, it shifts all wild life around it. Her nails along the hull allow the moon to pivot, and climbing her masts take lifetimes. She is crewed by men so large, that their smallest pipe is the size of a frigate. A Swedish ship of similair size, the Refanu, is so big that horses are used to relay orders. Her crew is thus of a relatively normal size, as opposed to giants that lumber about other such world ships.

More strange vessels under sail include one recroded by Ibn Battuta, the Lantern Ship. Once the ship was a demon that, on occasion, demanded sacrifices. It has since lost it’s powers, and is forced back by recitations of the Quran by local visitors or a priest.

All these vessels then serve as the start for our own. But what start is that? I think the two more modern moments that this prompt calls ot mind are from Tanith Lee’s Darkness’s Master and H.P. Lovecraft’s own Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath. In both, there is a celestial voyage to the heavens aboard a special craft. And I think, for both, the journey is more of an atmosphere of wonder or fear then it is a narrative. If we are to go to the moon, to the invisible world, a horror or fantasy that is mainly derived from strange monsters or explicit dooms is not the best. Better, I think, for something tinged with dread. A glimpse of the invisible, that unfolds. Something subtly moving, something just a little out of place. Of course, such writing is difficult. It’s not what I am used to, frankly, and doing something with subtly is not my strength.

Still, a story of a slowly vanishing ship under the moonlight, perhaps draped in mist, needs something more subtle then perhaps I would normally do.

Bibliography:
Basset, Fletcher S. Legends and Superstitions of the Sea Throughout History. Marston,Searle, and Rivington, 1885

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.

The River Runs Deep

This Week’s Prompt: 38. Drowning sensations—undersea—cities—ships—souls of the dead. Drowning is a horrible death.

The Resulting Story:Drowning Deep

To drown is to die a bad death. This prompt invites us to consider many aspects, many things that one might see down among the inky black of the sea. The image of an underwater city brings to mind fantastic locales of Atlantean ruins, but more directly brings to my mind (perhaps do to the morbidity of the rest of the subject matter) to an old Poe poem, presented here in abbreviated form(Because Poetry is Amazing).

City In The Sea
Lo! Death has reared himself a throne 
In a strange city lying alone 
Far down within the dim West, 
Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best 
Have gone to their eternal rest. 
There shrines and palaces and towers 
(Time-eaten towers that tremble not!) 
Resemble nothing that is ours. 
Around, by lifting winds forgot, 
Resignedly beneath the sky 
The melancholy waters he. 

The poem ties the deep, undersea city with elements of hideous horror, of time, and of Satan. All topics we’ve discussed before and one’s that provide plenty of room for horror. But we’ve done them before. We also covered the notions of some nautical myths in our talk on Rhode Island, although a few more regarding ships and the souls of the dead need mentioning.

There is of course the famous Flying Dutchman, made famous in the most contrasting roles I’ve seen: Davey Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean and Spongebob Squarepants. The Flying Dutchman is a continuation of sorts on the themes of the Wild Hunt Infernal: The Crew is condemned forever to plow the waves and skies. Davey himself seems to have a sordid past, either a devil himself or Jonah damning sailors yet. The souls of unfortunate sailors descend to his place, and in this way he holds all three of the elements as one.

Chilean Folklore presents another ship, however, manned by more then the dead. The Caleuche is a phantom ship at sea that contains not only the dead, but also gives instruction and transport to warlocks. To access the ship, a warlock must summon a Caballo marino chilote, a golden horse with a fishes tail. The King of The Sea would then permit transport to the ghostly vessel.

Of course, not all such water horses were kindly. The Scottish waterhorse would rather ride into thnae lakes and drown it’s rider than provide mystic aid. A plethora of drowning entities follow this route. The Siren sings to drown, as we’ve said before. Slavic Vodyanov and Rusalka drown those near their rivers as well.

My favorite drowner, as of late, is the Ahuitzotl. The river dog, as it is sometimes known, will lurk in the river and then drag you below with the hand behind its tail. After drowning, the little beast will eat the finger nails, eyes, and teeth. And oddly specific sort of animal.

These drownings provide a better plot, I believe, then the undersea city itself. There is something awful and personal about drowning: It is a death that kills and isolates inequal measure and rapidly. It is also often, to my mind, associated with suicides. It is hard to kill a man by drowning intentionally, as opposed to by poison or by a simple knife. It is a death that often involves much struggle or none at all, betokens either great force or a void of anything.

I think the story will take the form of a mystery then. A series of drowning, along a canal. The same spot. But is it, our inquisitive detective will wonder, the work of a murderer? Is the place now a nexus of despair, a self perpetuating site like some bridges become? I don’t want to say too much, as I have little to say. Come by next week to behold the horror that lurks beneath the surface.

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.

The Shack by the Shore

This weeks prompt:22. Mermaid Legend—Encyc. Britt. XVI—40.

This Week’s Research:The Siren Song

Almost fifteen years since I last was south of the border,a little envelope floats in from Uncle Guiles asking if I can come down to coastline to the shore. He needs help managing his fishing business, it says. Only descendant not to call the police on him, it says.  Normally I wouldn’t give it a second thought. Living alone with a slightly paranoid septuagenarian surrounded by rotting fish was a childhood nightmare.

But there was a pressing argument to leave town at the time. I had made a few promises I couldn’t keep, and had perhaps thrown my end of them into the sea out of some instinctual spite. And while that was understandable to myself, the other end of the arrangement wasn’t too happy.

It was an opportunity, I reasoned as I packed my bags and began the thousand mile southern drive. A chance to go to a foreign country and remote location, where the only person who knew me well was a loon with a gun who trusted non-family as far as he could through him.  So in my borrowed car, I parked at the nearest entrance.

Locals told me that Uncle Guiles(or Rabid Rob, as they called him) lived off between some cliffs. The place wasn’t reachable by car, sand was too wet. You had to go at low tide by foot, and carefully so as not to slip into the sea. It was a far cry from his hillside house when I was little.

It hurt the eyes to look at for starters. Big house made of cobbled together concrete blocks and sheets of metal riveted on. There were some hunks of driftwood arranged into something resembling a patio, but it looked like whoever made had heard of houses, and perhaps dimly glimpsed on through a broken telescope, and then set to work. That fool of man came hobbling out to greet me almost as soon as I rounded the corner.

“Davey! There you are. Was worried you’d gotten lost along the way. How’s the States?” he said gesturing for me to follow him through a sheet metal door that had a red circle spray-painted on it. The inside was surprisingly cool, although the entrance shook with every step. The hallways were occasionally line with “artful” bits of driftwood spray painted primary colors and with seashells hanging from them on fishing line.

“As always, tearing themselves a part. You build all this yourself?” I asked as we entered what the living room. I admit, I was surprised it had real furniture.

“You know it. Can’t let anyone know the layout who isn’t living here. When it all comes crashing down, they might break in.”

“Right, right, makes sense,” I said putting down my bags down. “So, fishing giving you trouble?”

Before he could speak, there was a groan from the floor that shook the house. It wasn’t a pleasant sound, girders grinding down. Uncle Guiles paused for a moment, listening careful to the noise, his eyes drifted up to corner. It stopped after a bit, and his eyes slowly falling back.

“Oh don’t mind that. Tides and waves, they sometimes slip under the sand near the basement, shake things around. Doesn’t break the rock and foundation just shifts it around,” he said, waving his hands to shoo away any questions. “Must just be tide changing is all. Anyway, fishing, sort of. I need someone to go into town for me, errand you know? I got a nice bit saved away, but someone needs to collect the paperwork and the groceries and the like.”

I nodded along. Simple enough it seemed.

“Anyway, that’s what I need mostly. A go between with me and the  main land. But that’s enough business for now. We got until low tide comes back in the morning to work that all out. Let me show you around some.” He said, gesturing. The groaning below got louder.

The rest of the, dare I call it, house was in various states of disrepair or mid-construction. There was a thin layer of sand everywhere. But kitchen was something like clean, with clay plates and some store bought knives. The table was impressive, in that a couple hunks of scrapeyard metal resembled a proper dinning apparatus. Still, Uncle Guiles’s pride in it all was contagious.

The tour ended with the upstairs, where to my delight the bed was more than some piled together straw. I nearly collapsed on the mattress, and probably would have fallen asleep at Uncle Robinson’s chuckling if it weren’t for the still audible groaning and moaning from the walls. It seemed almost louder with more wall to resound off of.

Uncle Guiles again assured me it was just some shifting girders, nothing much to worry about. The foundation was secure and solid stone.

We stayed up a bit late that night, drinking the moonshine Uncle Guiles called beer. It was nice, for a moment, to enjoy a beer and only hear the crashing of the waves against the cliffs. In a drunken stupor, Uncle Robinson gestured for me to follow him back into the living room, to “see his treasure”.

Laughing all the way about the numerous innuendos that phrase has, I stumbled into the clattering room. It was barely lit by a lamp Uncle Guiles carried as he stumbled with the little lock. With a scrapping creak it opened up.

“What you have, some more seashell art?” I asked peering around. And then I saw them.

Behind a set of fishing nets, jewelry like you wouldn’t believe. Golden combs with inlaid pearls, necklaces with coral woven into the gold. I’ve seen lots of jewelry in my former line of work, I honestly have. But this was something else, something amazing.

“Christ, what are you doing hiding in a shack like this?” I said blinking, a moment of soberity installed by the wonder of it all.

“What, and part with it? There so beautiful, I couldn’t bear it, couldn’t bear it if they were anywhere else. Maybe when I’m gone, I’ll leave’em to someone else.” He said, reaching through and gently stroking one of the combs. The now constant hum seemed to drop in pitch a bit as he did so. Some part of me thought the sea felt him, and disliked him for it.

I couldn’t sleep that night. I could still hear the groaning, only now I faintly made out words, and pitches. A melody. I got up and paced a bit. The noise continued though, and peering through what passes for windows. The tide was going out again, seashells piling along the sides. Strange, the song was still coming from within.

It was then I realized I hadn’t seen the basement yet. Carefully stepping down the stairs, raising my foot to avoid making any more sounds. The sound grew louder and louder. But beneath it I heard someone murmuring something. I stood perfectly still on the last stair.

“That’ll do for tonight, my little fish, that’ll do. I’ll see you in the morn.”

I heard Uncle Guiles foot steps, heading into the kitchen. Quietly, I slipped around and saw the basement door open a jar. The noise, now a clear multi melody song. Deep and high, and pained. I found a lantern hanging beside the door, and gripping it, I opened the door slowly.

The flames reflection flickered back at me in a hundred eyes, a flickering multitude of pitiful forms. They resembled women of a sort, with the lower half of seals. Their teeth, needle like, showed as they made their strange song. Some had flickering blue lights along their hair and tails, some had spines like a lionfish. And …things, things like children with smooth eel skin peaked out between them. Little bits of fish and bones were scattered on the floor and hanging out of their mouths. And all their eye stared into mine.

I stumbled more than stepped back.  The lantern swung and I felt it slip. As I frantically reached out to catch myself, I saw its little flame and oil splash about as it fell. The glass shattered, and the fire spread across it. The drift wood ornaments began to catch, making torches. The metal was heating up too, I could feel sweat running down my brow.

In a short while, there was shouting from the kitchen. Uncle Guiles, well, there was no saving him I decided. He’d either sort himself out or suffer the price of building such a shoddy place. That being sad, the second thought that ran through my head was the gold. I leapt over flame and between netting to get to it. The iron closet, the jewelry. Uncle Guiles was shouting something, I couldn’t make it out over the now angry song and his own constant coughing.

“Sorry it didn’t work out, I’ll meet with you later, thanks!” I shouted, pocketing all I could carry and running out. The tide had retracted, but I was exhausted. I tripped, I hate to say, I tripped and the gold fell into the see. And then came the most awful sound.

Locals will confirm this part of the story, but even without them, I know what I saw. The sea roared, roared with an angry dirge. A wave rose, over a dozen feet tall, right in front of the now blazing house. AS I pulled myself to my feet, I saw Uncle Guiles running from the house, screaming. Hundreds of hands waited for him in the waves, grabbing and tearing at his skin.  A thunderous voice, a chorus coming to Holt’s Neptune the Magician came bursting from the crowd.

Later that morning, it will be found, the newspapers reported a particularly large mass of metal and concrete washed ashore without explanation. I made my peace with his few dependents, and took possession of a safe box with a little over a hundred American dollars. I decided that perhaps a remote mountain peak would serve me instead.

Well, the corpses ill gotten gains had a tale to tell. What did you find dear brothers and sisters?

If you’d like to support the Society, receive more stories or research, or are feeling generous, please check out our Patreon here.