#silent hill: reverie

[friendlyfangs]

scarryyy ooooo

[lilrainbowcloud]

Pairing: Luke Castellan x Child of Apollo! Reader

Genre: Fluff, tinsy bit of angst || masterlist

[17:56]

As the sun dipped lower, casting a warm, orange hue across the camp, Luke couldn't help but smile at the beauty of the moment. He marvelled at the way the soft light accentuated the lines of your profile as you continued to sketch, completely absorbed in your creative world.

Every stroke of your pencil seemed deliberate, and Luke found himself captivated by the dance of your fingers across the paper. He admired the way you embraced each mistake, turning it into a stepping stone toward perfection. Your determination resonated with him, creating a silent connection between the two of you amidst the artistic ambiance of the natural museum.

The low hum of activities below you served as a gentle background melody to the symphony of creativity. Luke, despite his initial boredom, found solace in the atmosphere you created. The earthy scent of aged land became a comforting fragrance, blending seamlessly with the soft glow of the setting sun atop the hill you both were perched. Tucked away from your responsibilities for a stolen amount of time.

As the shadows deepened, he couldn't help but be drawn to your presence. The way you navigated the challenges of your sketch with grace and resilience painted a vivid picture of your character. The occasional clicks of your tongue and sighs of frustration only added to the authenticity of the scene.

In those two hours, Luke discovered a new layer to his admiration for you. It wasn't just about your artistic prowess; it was the way you approached life with clarity and purpose. Your goals were like brushstrokes on a canvas, creating a masterpiece of determination and focus. It was a mindset he longed to adopt, a reflection of the strength he saw in you.

Leaning back on the soft meadow, Luke let his gaze linger on you once more, silently appreciating the artistry in both your sketch and the person you were becoming. The hill wasn't just a haven for perfect view and fresh air; it was a sanctuary where he found himself falling deeper for the girl whose heart had become an unspoken part of his own.

As you gathered your art supplies and rose from the ground, the echoes of the conch shell served as a reminder that it was nearing dinner time resonated its way to you. The tiredness from hours of focused sketching settled in, and a yawn escaped your lips as you stretched, feeling the satisfying pull in your muscles.

Luke, standing in front of you, extended his hand with a warm smile. His invitation to dinner was a welcomed interruption to your creative reverie. However, your determination to finish your work lingered, and you pouted in response, expressing your reluctance to leave.

"But I'm not finished yet," you protested, hoping for a bit more time. Luke chuckled, understanding your dedication but also knowing the practicality of the situation. "They're going to look for you if you stay. Come on. We’ll come back here again tomorrow.”

However, the promise of tomorrow fades, for today marks the final sunset you'll share with him before returning to your mother's home. Tomorrow, you bid farewell to the comfort you've known, a hiatus until your return in the summer. How you yearn for your father to extend his presence longer. Yet, with each step, Selene, the goddess of the moon, ascends gracefully, draping the sky with her veil of darkness and adorning it with a myriad of stars.

That night, your tears twinkled alongside them as they poured.

[seriiousgiirl]

𝕭𝖑𝖔𝖔𝖉 𝕴𝖓 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖂𝖎𝖓𝖊.

. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ݁𝓛𝓸𝓻𝓭!𝓐𝓼𝓽𝓪𝓻𝓲𝓸𝓷 𝔁 𝓻𝓮𝓪𝓭𝓮𝓻. ⊹ ₊ ݁.

. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ 𝔰𝔲𝔪𝔪𝔞𝔯𝔶 . ⊹ ₊ ݁. ❛ You lied to me! I did. You poisoned me! I did. You said you loved me! I do. ❜ After the death of your father, you are thrown into the bustling town of Baldur's Gate, leaving behind the peaceful country manor you called home. Eager for a taste of freedom, you slip away one night and find yourself rescued by the enigmatic Lord Ancunin. As you spend more time with him, you learn of his links with the mysterious Duke Szarr and his own secrets. As a result, you find yourself entangled in a web of deceit and betrayal. But as the truth unfolds, amid whispers of scandal and echoes of forgotten secrets, lies the key to your salvation - or your downfall. . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ ݁𝔠𝔬𝔫𝔱𝔢𝔫𝔱. ⊹ ₊ ݁. regency!au, strangers to lovers, slow burn, tension, mutual pining, angst, smut will happen later, age difference, forced marriage, gothic setting. Hello everyone! It's been a while since I've written for the public, but I hope it'll be OK. :) After binge watching Bridgerton and rewatching Crimson Peak, I thought an AU with Astarion would be perfect. Enjoy!!

. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 . ⊹ ₊ ݁.

The grand oak doors of Thornfield Manor creak open for what you know will be the last time. A gust of wind, carrying the chill of an early spring morning, sweeps through the entrance hall. You clutch your mother’s hand, seeking comfort in the warmth of her touch, though her face is a mask of composure, betraying no hint of the turmoil you know brews within her.

After all, Father's sudden passing has left you in a state of shock and uncertainty. 

The estate, with its sprawling gardens and serene countryside views, is now a mere memory, a chapter of your life that has been abruptly closed. With your elder brother away on military duty and the estate debts proving insurmountable, there was no choice but to seek refuge in the city.

And for that, your mother had plans, and the most important one was to find you a husband. If you were honest with yourself, you would have preferred that your mother had died instead, but that thought was forbidden. You knew that your father who had always shown you warmth and kindness, would have never wished for that kind of marriage for his beloved daughter—but he wasn’t here anymore to contest your mother’s decision. 

As the carriage rattled down the cobblestone path leading away from your beloved Thornfield, you cast one last, lingering glance at the manor. The ivy-clad walls seem to whisper farewells, and the distant hills, where you had spent countless afternoons in joyous exploration, stand as silent sentinels of a life left behind.

Your destination is Baldur's Gate, a bustling city known for its mercantile prowess and vibrant social scene. The city looms ahead, a stark contrast to the tranquility of your rural home. You had visited Baldur's Gate but once before, as a child, and the memory of its crowded streets and imposing architecture fills you with a mix of trepidation and reluctant curiosity.

Mother squeezes your hand, pulling you from your reverie. "We must be strong, Y/n," she says, her voice steady yet tinged with a sorrow that mirrors your own. "Baldur's Gate may not hold the peace of Thornfield, but it will offer us opportunities.” By ‘opportunities,’ you knew she meant a noble man to marry. And, you also knew that you had little or no say in who it’ll be.

“We shall endure this, together."

“Yes, mother.” You nodded, though your heart ached with the weight of your loss. 

The city, with its promise of new beginnings, felt both a blessing and a burden. What awaited you in the bustling streets of Baldur's Gate, however, you could not say…

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

It had been a week since you arrived at your new house in the city, and to your surprise, integrating into high society wasn't as hard as you might have imagined. Your father had left a positive impact on his Thornfield wine business, which smoothed many social pathways. Your family name carried weight, opening doors that might have otherwise remained closed.

The house itself was grand, located in a prosperous district, with wide windows that overlooked bustling streets. From the confines of your room, you observed the city’s vibrant life. Baldur's Gate was a place of diversity and wonder. Elves with their ethereal grace, dwarves bustling about their trades, drows with their mysterious allure, and even Tieflings, with their exotic and often misunderstood appearances, filled the streets below. Yet, you experienced this only as a distant observer, confined by your mother's strict rules.

Your mother, with her cold demeanor, had forbidden you to venture outside until the wedding season began. "It wouldn't do for you to be seen mingling with common folk," she had said, her tone brooking no argument. 

The days were monotonous and long—very long, filled with preparations for the social season. You spent hours with dressmakers, trying on elaborate gowns, and with tutors, brushing up on etiquette and dance. 

Perhaps if your mother had been more aware of your need to see the outside world, you would have never found yourself in this situation. Late at night, as the city slumbered, you found yourself wandering the unfamiliar streets alone, without a chaperon or a maid to accompany you. 

It was a reckless act, one born out of a desperate longing for freedom.

You had always been like that, even in the peaceful countryside surrounding Thornfield Manor. An adventurous spirit, yearning to explore beyond the familiar boundaries of home, you often found solace in wandering the forests alone and in the dappled sunlight filtering through the tree.

But the city was a different beast altogether. 

The streets of Baldur's Gate took on a different character under the cloak of darkness. Shadows danced along the cobblestones, and the faint glow of lanterns cast eerie shapes against the walls of the surrounding buildings. It was dangerous, you knew, for a young woman of your standing to venture out unaccompanied. 

You told yourself it was curiosity that led you here, a desire to explore the streets that had been forbidden to you by day. But in truth, it was something deeper, a yearning for independence…

The city was a maze of winding alleys and hidden courtyards. You passed taverns alive with music and laughter, and dimly lit shops adorned with treasures from distant lands. The air was heavy with the scent of spices and sea salt. As you turned down a narrow alleyway, you caught sight of movement in the shadows ahead.

Instinctively, you froze, your heart pounding in your chest. 

A ragtag group of drunken men emerged from the shadows, their laughter loud and lewd. They were a motley crew indeed, their clothes stained, their faces red and flushed from excessive consumption. At their head stood a particularly large man, his arms bulging with muscle, a thick beard hiding the lower half of his face.

Their eyes raked over your body, appraising you in a way that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end. You could almost feel their filthy thoughts, a cold shiver snaking its way down your spine.

"Well, well, what do we have here?" the large man bellowed, his voice thick with drink.

"Hey there, sweetheart,"another one of them slurred, reaching out a hand to grab at your arm. "What's a pretty thing like you doing out here all alone?" The others chuckled, closing in around you, their foul breath making you recoil. 

Their hands reached for you, grasping and groping, their touch repulsive and unwanted. “No, let me go!” You tried to push them away, but they were relentless. You felt your heart sink, fear gripping you like a vice. Just as you thought all hope was lost, a shadow detached itself from the wall behind you, a tall figure emerging from the darkness.

His gaze was hard and unyielding as he surveyed the scene before him. His clothes were finely made, a stark contrast to the ragged group that surrounded you. He was handsome, his features sharp and angular, his eyes as red as ruby itself.

"Step aside, gentlemen," he said, his voice low and commanding.

The men snarled, but his demeanor was intimidating, and they reluctantly parted, allowing him to stand before you, his hands finding their place on your hips. "Are you alright, miss?" he asked, his concern dramatic but evident.

You nodded, swallowing hard, your heart still pounding in your chest. You could feel the heat of his body, the warmth of it a comforting contrast to the cold hand that had moments ago crept up your thigh.

"Thank you," you whispered, the words barely audible.

He offered you his arm, helping you to slip yours through it. "Let us take our leave from this place before further trouble arrives, it would be embarrassing for a lady like you to see more of this world of debauchery, wouldn't it?”

You nodded, grateful for his intervention and eager to put the unsettling encounter behind you. "Yes, please," you agreed, clinging to his arm as he guided you away from the shadows and back towards the safety of the main thoroughfare.

As you walked, he turned to you with a charming smile, his gaze warm and inquisitive. "Forgive me for prying, but are you new to the city?" he asked, his tone light with curiosity. "I feel certain I would have remembered such a pretty face."

You couldn't help but blush at the compliment, flustered by his attention. "Yes, we just arrived," you admitted, a hint of uncertainty in your voice. "We're staying in the...uh...West End district."

His smile widened, a glint of amusement dancing in his eyes. "Ah, the West End," he remarked. "A fine choice. It's fortunate for you that our paths crossed tonight. Allow me to see you safely home."

You hesitated for a moment, unsure whether to trust this stranger, but the sincerity in his gaze reassured you. "Thank you," you said again, feeling a wave of gratitude wash over you. "I would appreciate that."

The walk through the quiet streets of Baldur's Gate was surprisingly calm, the tension from the alley fading with each step. As you strolled, the distinctive scent of his cologne filled the air—a mix of bergamot, brandy, and rosemary that was both intriguing and comforting. 

The gentleman beside you hummed a gentle tune, the melody soothing in the stillness of the night.

You found yourself relaxing in his presence, the fear and anxiety of earlier moments melting away. He maintained a respectful silence, his humming the only sound breaking the night's tranquility. As the familiar sight of your new home came into view, you felt a mixture of relief and disappointment—the walk had been unexpectedly pleasant.

Pausing at the gate of your residence, he turned to you with a concerned expression. "You should be more careful next time," he advised, his tone teasing but warm. He casually reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief to gently wipe a smudge of dirt from your cheek. His touch was light, almost tender, and when he smiled, you thought you saw a flash of something unusual—were those fangs? You blinked, and the moment passed, leaving you to wonder if your imagination was playing tricks on you.

Then, with a gesture both casual and deliberate, he placed the handkerchief in your hand.

You felt the cool, smooth fabric of his glove brush against your skin as he pressed the handkerchief into your palm. The contact was brief, but the sensation of his fingers grazing yours sent an unexpected shiver down your spine. His touch was light yet lingering, creating a moment of intimate connection that left you breathless.

"You can keep it," he said, his voice soft but firm, the authority in his tone leaving no room for refusal.

"Thank you," you murmured, feeling a flush of embarrassment at the fuss he was making over you. Your fingers tightened around the handkerchief, the delicate fabric still warm from his touch. "For everything."

"It was my pleasure," he replied, his smile widening into a grin that was both charming and slightly unsettling. "I couldn't leave a lady in distress. Now, go inside and rest. The city can be a treacherous place after dark."

You nodded, grateful for his kindness despite the lingering mystery about him. As you turned to enter your home, you glanced back one last time. He stood there, bathed in the soft glow of the streetlamps, watching you with an unreadable expression. 

"I didn't catch your name," you said, your curiosity piqued despite the urgency to retreat indoors.

He merely smiled in response, a knowing glint in his eyes. "It won't be necessary," he replied cryptically.

With a final nod, you slipped inside, bolting the door behind you.

Safe within the familiar walls, you leaned against the door, your mind racing with the events of the night. 

Who was he?

❛ masterlist ⋅ ao3 ❜

[the-dork-urge]

|| Joy || Zevlor x Tav

For sweet @beardedladyqueen REQUEST: Fluff / comfort with Zevlor in a committed relationship with Tav (post-game). He is feeling worthless and AFAB!Tav take this moment of self loathing to announce to him that they are pregnant. 😍🫄(any gender for Tav is fine of course ! )

Wordcount: 1300-ish

Leaning against the wooden fence that he just finished building, Zevlor gazes out over the hills with a faraway look in his eyes. His hands bear the telltale signs of recent labor – smudges of fresh soil and traces of sawdust on his calloused fingertips. His expression is one of quiet contemplation, as though lost in memories of days gone by or dreams of the future. The hills seem to stretch out forever onwards, their slopes blanketed in lush greenery. A scattering of trees dot the horizon. In the distance, a meandering stream glints in the sunlight. He wipes his brow and unbuttons his blouse, revealing a thin layer of sweat on his chest.He breathes in as he clamps his hands around the wood, the fresh air mixes with the smell of freshly cut wood, and a bittersweet smile plays on his face. Peace. After all. Yet, beneath the veneer of tranquility, a subtle tension lingers, like a faint shadow cast upon his countenance. In this moment of quiet reflection, he acknowledges all that surrounds him: a loving wife, a comforting home, and the precious gift of freedom. He considers the simplicity of his existence, where the weight of a sword no longer hangs heavy upon his shoulders unless he willingly chooses to wield it. There's no external pressure dictating his actions, no demands dictating his path anymore. Only the gentle rhythm of life, flowing freely like the streams that meander through the distant hills. However, a persistent unease lingers, intricately woven into the very essence of his being, a quiet companion to his moments of tranquility. He has come to terms with it, recognizing it as a sentiment he will carry throughout his life, guilt, and sadness imprinted on his heart like subtle scars. With her by his side, the burden becomes more bearable, a shared weight that makes the journey worthwhile. Far away in his reverie, Zevlor remains unaware of his wife's approach, her bare feet gently padding across the dew-kissed grass as she navigates through the blossoming garden. Daisies and tulips sway in the breeze, their vibrant colors a testament to the love and labor they had poured into the earth together. As she finally reaches his side, she places a hand on his shoulder. "The fence looks great, my love," she says, her eyes tracing the contours of his form. Zevlor stands slightly sweaty from his exertions, his forearm muscles strained from the labor. His blouse hangs open, revealing a glimpse of his chest. This was the image she had grown to love, her handsome husband who never failed to set her heart aflutter with tiny little butterflies. She did not need a big hero. Just him. All of it . She leans in to kiss him, her gaze drifting towards the hills as well, yet he remains unstirred beside her, his reaction muted ''Are you alright?'' she asks as she senses the quiet turmoil that clouds his demeanor. Concern etches lines upon her brow as she searches her husband's eyes for answers. For a moment, Zevlor remains silent. Then, slowly, he turns to face her, his eyes meeting hers as he kisses her forehead "I will be," he murmurs, his voice barely above a whisper. He reaches for her hand, finding solace in her touch. "Just lost in thought, I suppose.'' A hint of a smile tugs at the corners of his mouth, growing ever more visible the longer he looks at her. "Speak to me about it, Zevlor," she urges gently. Without hesitation, she maneuvers between him and the fence, effortlessly climbing atop it. Leaning against him, she waits for him to speak. Zevlor wraps his arms around her, steadying her against his bare chest, her hair clinging to the thin veil of sweat.

"Sometimes I wonder," Zevlor murmurs softly, his voice carrying the weight of introspection, " about all these 'what ifs' plaguing my mind." He pauses, allowing the words to linger in the air between them.

He rests his chin on her shoulders, holding her even tighter, his voice tinged with regret. "How different this could have been, you know?"

''Not that I need anything else,'' he quickly trails back. ''This, you and me. It's perfect, yet I can't help but imagine,'' his words a delicate admission of the complexities that dance within the corridors of his thoughts. His wife's gentle voice on the breeze, a soothing sound amidst the tumult of his thoughts. "You'll drive yourself mad if you let those thoughts suffocate you," she cautions. "Life is too intricate to dwell on what-ifs.''

''I try not to,'' she continues, a hint of nostalgia toning her words, "I regret some paths taken, but I don't blame myself anymore. Those decisions brought me to this point, right here with you." Her words envelop Zevlor like a comforting embrace, reassuring him that despite the twists and turns of their journey, they've found each other, and therein lies their true happiness, where guilt can be buried among tulips and daisies.

"Besides," she muses, stepping down from the fence and brushing past her husband as she moves into the garden.

With a twirl, her dress swirls behind her, and the apron she had aimlessly fastened around her middle falls to the grass between the flowers. "We should focus on what could be," she says, her smile stretching from ear to ear, ''for the future holds endless possibilities.'' In the gentle embrace of the setting sun, she is a vision of beauty. Her hair aglow with the warm light, bare feet grounded on the lush grass beneath her. Behind her stands their home, adorned with potted flowers and brick walls, with veins of ivy climbing towards the vibrant shingles above. He can't help but smile at the sight of her, his heart swelling with affection as he quickly moves towards her, wiping his dirt-stained hands on his pants. Then he reaches for her, his hands snaking around her as he curls his fingers in the fabric of her blouse. Their surroundings seem to fade away as he envelops her in his arms, the worries of the day dissipating into the ether. With a tender kiss planted on her forehead, he whispers softly, "You're right, my love. And I wouldn't want to face them with anyone else."

She brings her hand up to his face, cupping his cheeks, her breath warm against his lips. "Not even with our child?" she whispers, her words a gentle caress against his skin, before closing the distance between them in a tender kiss. His eyes widen in surprise as her words sink in, his mouth falling agape momentarily before breaking into a smile against her lips. He returns her kiss with equal fervor, savoring the sweetness of the moment. Pulling back slightly, he breathes in deeply, his voice barely above a whisper as he speaks, "Our baby?" Tears welling in his eyes, he feels a lump form in his throat, his eyes growing misty. He can't remember the last time he shed tears of joy, but in this moment, the experience feels like the most natural thing in the world. With a trembling hand, he reaches out to gently caress her belly, the weight of the momentous occasion sinking in.

"Hmm," she softly hums, her voice a soothing melody. "You'll be a great father, Zevlor."

Her words stir a mix of emotions within him. The idea of a little one fills him with a profound fear, a battle more daunting than wielding his sword in the depths of Avernus. Yet, amidst the trepidation, an overwhelming happiness surges through him. It's a sensation entirely new, a radiant warmth that consumes him entirely. As he looks upon his wife's smiling face, her hand cradling her belly, he recognizes that this feeling is not fleeting; it has the potential to soothe the wounds etched upon his heart.

Ps: I need someone to draw, hot, domestic Zevlor for me, open blouse, sweaty and all, pls ty

MASTERLIST

[gretavanlace]

Crime and Punishment

Jake Kiszka x reader

18+ only! Minors do not interact!

Warnings: graphic sexual content, language, dirty talk, denial, dom/sub, anger, pet names, illusions to impact play, impact play (mild), masturbation, etc

Just a little something to tide my lovelies over. Thank you so much to my anon who asked for a quieter dom jake (I can’t find your ask, but I love you)❤️

“Jake?” You venture carefully from your seat beside him as he stares ahead, navigating the twists and turns of hills and back roads, wipers keeping time through the rain. “You seem upset. Are you alright?”

You know he isn’t alright. You fucking know. Worked toward it all evening, bratting this way and that. Mouthing off. Causing trouble. Flirting with Danny. Let’s be honest, flirting with Sammy, as well…innocently. Flirting with Josh, not so innocently.

You drank a little too much, danced a little too close, spoke a little too softly in an ear or two - and all while he quietly watched. All while he silently drank in your display, swallowing it down for safe, darkened, keeping.

“M’fine, magpie.” He offers with a gentle shrug “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Okay, so maybe he isn’t as angry as you’d feared, hoped? He’s still allowing your nickname, bestowed because he says you sing so pretty when you cum for him, to trip off of his delectable tongue. Perhaps his upset doesn’t run quite as deeply as you believed.

“You’re not angry with me?”

“Why would I be angry with you?” His jaw tightens, betraying him. Liar.

“Dunno.” You shrug right back, if he’s going to play it this way, so will you. Beginning to dig around in your purse, at last, you locate your lighter and cigarettes, flickering one to life with a deep, drunken drag.

Immediately, he rips it from your lips and flips it out the crack in his window, with a clipped, “You haven’t earned it.”

He knows you enjoy the most occasional smoke when you’re floating through a buzz, and this proves what you already knew - his placid demeanor is bullshit.

You clip your bag closed with a sly smile and sidle up a little closer, “Oh, so Jakey is feeling angry? Are you mad at your girl?”

With a firm hand, he pushes you back in your seat, and shakes his head, “Stop talking. Now. Don’t make me say it twice.”

Something in his tone tells you to listen…his warning sounds like it's riding out on broken glass, and his palm, flattened out on your chest, heavy like a paperweight, tells you to find your place, and find it fast.

The galvanic hiss of his energy pops and sparks into the night as you cruise closer to home, but that isn’t what knots your stomach into bends and hitches - his silence is what does that.

Normally, he’d be taunting you. Promising fire and brimstone, forewarning forthcoming doom, sounding the alarms in your head…if only to make your heart and your clit pound.

He prizes it - this ability of his to so easily make you sweat and ache…loves it all the more when it’s an impending punishment he can lord over your pretty head. That’s what you’d been aiming at all night - his wrath…but this, this quiet? Unsettling.

“Jacob Thomas…” you’ve tried on your sweetest tone, allowing a pout to color his full name in the way that never fails to make his cock twitch. Like a game of hide and seek. Come out, come out wherever you are.

“Shut. Up.” His knuckles turn white on the steering wheel and you do, in fact, choose to listen and shut up.

Gravel crunching beneath the tires signals your homecoming, jarring you out of your foggy reverie. What will happen now? You’d be dishonest if you said you weren’t positively fucking alive with racing thoughts of carnal possibilities. You’d also be dishonest if you said you weren’t a tad apprehensive…something in his manner is off. Have you pushed too far this time? Are you really in for it? Do you like the idea of roaring along his furious rapids without a paddle? Paddle. Now there’s an idea.

A caul of tense silence crawls over the car as he breathes heavily and deeply beside you. Finally, his clipped instructions break the spell.

“You are to go inside and wait at the foot of the bed. Naked. On your knees. Hair braided and clipped.”

You shiver at his ragged directive, he sounds like sex, and you can smell the lust seeping from his pores— masked almost entirely by his fury, but there all the same.

Turning to him to beg for just one touch is so tempting you can almost taste the words on your palate, but wisely, you settle on obedience, and squeak open the door before hustling it into the house.

If you had eyes in the back of your head you might have caught the faint smile that curls his pillowy lips as he watches you fumble to fit the key in the lock with shaking hands. You’re nervous, he decides. Good.

He finds you, kneeling and bare - fucking gorgeous. Your hair is woven and swept up, just as instructed. It earns you points, but certainly not enough to matter, and you seem to sense that as you watch him calmly prowl about the bedroom.

His jacket comes off first, shaken from his shoulders in the stillness, only to be rested carefully over the back of his chair. He loves this chair, sits in its overstuffed embrace and plucks at his guitar for hours. But tonight, he has other tasks to complete.

He rids himself of his barely buttoned shirt and lets it fall to the floor, forgotten…and then swaggers over to the dresser, carefully removing his necklaces and nestling them into the velvet case that houses his trinkets.

Boots, having seen better days just the way he likes them, are next. Kicked off and cast aside next to the closet door.

And all the while it’s quiet, quiet, quiet. Normally, he’d be scolding you, issuing soft admonishments that still somehow thunder in your heart as though he’s shouted them. Normally he’s bossy, and mouthy, and sexy as hell about it. Tonight? Silence.

Still, you wait - knelt, submissive, unresisting and docile. Patiently and quietly subservient as your nipples harden into aching peaks, desperate for even a flick of his gaze.

Without blessing you the glance you’re so longing for, he disappears into the closet, only to return with his black leather guitar case. You know this case, you know what it houses, and it isn’t a musical instrument. Though, he does coax lovely sounds out of you with the arsenal hidden inside.

At last, his voice comes, hushed and conversational, as he carefully places the case on the bed and flips the latches. “I shouldn’t, because you’ve been a dreadful handful tonight, but I’m feeling generous, so I will. You may pick your poison this evening, magpie.”

With precision, he chooses his arrows and lines them up along the duvet. Paddle, flogger, crop, switch, length of leather he braided and knotted with his own hands, and cane. You fear the cane most of all…the way it slices through the air audibly; a woeful song just before the pain explodes and sizzles through your system. Still, your eyes linger there once he’s given you permission to turn and look. Maybe you want that tonight.

Though he doesn’t tip his hand, Jake knows exactly what you need. He can sense all of that shameful desire swimming through your veins. He understands that you live in your head a little too deeply now and then. His grasp on your psyche, uncanny. You need this sometimes, this complete submission…his hands offering sacrament with each blow. His words washing you clean in their dominance, their degradation, their praise. He needs it too, to give you these things that might make another shudder and turn away.

He craves the way you blink up at him, eyes blurred with tears, lips swollen and dripping in sobs and breaths of reverence. The way your body yields to his touch, trembling with pleasure tinged in delicious, trustful fear. He is weak for the way you allow him to worship you this way…an outsider might see the opposite, might believe it is you who worships from your place at his feet, they would be terribly mistaken. It is he who prays.

Perhaps it has been a little too long, so you chose to act up in order to force his hand. Perhaps that is his fault. Perhaps. But you will never know it.

“Your behavior was uncalled for tonight.” He sighs, fingers skating across his toys while you contemplate. “For it, I should cane you until you can’t breathe. But, I’m feeling kind. What do we say?”

His fingers have begun to stroke through your bangs. “We say thank you.” You hush with a shiver, “Thank you for your mercy, sir.”

He nods, and then squares his shoulders, impatience edging at him. “Choose, or I will. You don’t want that.”

When your touch lands on the cane, he hides his shock well and bends until his delicious mouth rests against your ear. “Magpie wants my cane? Aren’t you just the prettiest glutton for punishment that I’ve ever seen?”

“Make it hurt.” You’re shaking with depraved anticipation, and he wants to huff a laugh - his lovely little masochist - instead, he tucks the cane away, confusing you.

“Well, darling,” he dips down and places the softest feather of a kiss upon the nape of your neck. “If you want it, that’s not much of a punishment at all, now is it?”

He has decided that, in honor of your wanton little show with his brothers, he will wield his authority in a different manner tonight. You will suffer, but not in the way you might have hoped.

Straightening, he takes your chin loosely in his grasp and tilts your face upwards until he is looking down the bridge of his nose at you. “On the bed, magpie. Right on the edge, legs spread wide open for me. I’d like to look at your pretty cunt.”

Without waiting to watch you comply, he turns and makes his way back to the chair he loves so well, and takes a seat casually. By the time he has settled in, you’re perched on display for him.

“So gorgeous, little bird.” He hums softly, popping the button of his pants. The parting of his zipper causes your entire body to jolt in hunger. “Look at that pretty fucking pussy. You’re so wet I can almost smell you.”

His hand dips behind linen and tugs his cock free. So hard and beautiful. Swollen tip leaking pearlescent drops of arousal that you long to lick away.

“Jake,” you whine, body rocking against nothing so subtly, you don’t even realize it’s happening.

“I told you to shut up.” He snaps, wrapping his fist around himself with a slow, easy tug.

“Yes, sir.” You breathe. A little groveling never hurt anyone.

“You will take what you’re given tonight, and you will thank me for it.” He’s stroking himself with intent now, and you couldn’t look away if you tried. You just want him so fucking badly. “And I so love to spoil you, don’t I?”

“Yes, sir.” You repeat, hushed, and fighting to keep your hand from dipping between your legs.

“And now you’ve ruined that for me, which wasn’t very nice.” He clicks his tongue. “My mean, filthy, little magpie owes me an apology, does she not?”

“I’m sorry.” You sound pathetic, and that’s fine for the both of you. “I just wanted—“

“I know what you wanted.” He interrupts, words rasped as he jerks his cock off just a bit faster. “I didn’t ask for your fucking explanations. Let me see that lovely little clit, I miss her.”

Reaching down, you spread yourself open without thought or hesitation. What Jake wants, Jake gets. Funnily enough, however, he feels the same about you…usually.

“There she is…” you watch his fist tighten around his length…god, you want it so badly it’s nearly difficult to think. Your thoughts, scattered and blurred with want. “Look how pretty and pink. And swollen, too.” He tilts his head sorrowfully. “Such a shame. I could so easily take care of her…if you hadn’t acted like such a whore tonight. And for what?”

“You know why.” You huff, growing slightly insufferable with desire.

“Watch that fucking tone or I’ll spread you out, tie you down, and correct you until the sun comes up.” His warning drives out harshly from between clenched teeth.

He watches the insubordination silently leech from your bones. “That’s a good girl. Can you feel it, baby? My tongue on your clit? Warm and wet, licking and sucking you until your cum is dripping down my chin? Hmm? Can you feel that?”

And fuck if you can’t. You’re conjuring the feeling of his mouth working away at you sinfully, the sounds he makes, groans and hums of bliss that muffle into your soaked flesh. They crowd your mind until it is fat full with Jacob and only Jacob.

“I’d love to taste you, magpie.” He sighs, fucking his fist faster still. “I’d love to crawl over there and bury my face between your thighs. Love to slip my tongue way up inside until my nose is buried against you. Until I can’t fucking breathe.”

“Please.” Is the only word you can manage, and even that comes out weak and warbling.

“Tough love, little bird.” He taunts. Tough love. And it’s only because I care…I don’t want to see you go completely off the rails, I’ve gotta keep you in line, don’t I?”

Your body twitches and writhes and shakes all on its own…you’ve lost control of your muscles. Your veins are searing with fiery need, nerve endings buzzing and sparking like downed power lines. Mouth open and panting like a cornered animal in need of something it can’t quite identify. You want to claw at your body until you can climb out of yourself; until you can discard your own skin like an itchy sweater in a room that’s just a little too warm.

But even if all that were possible, none of it would help, you know as fact, only Jake can soothe you now. Only Jake.

Suddenly, he rises, kicking his pants off along the way as he moves closer to you, closing in on your trembling frame like a gleeful predator.

His body, bare and stunning, glows ghostly in the shadowy moonlight that streams through the curtains. You can smell him now, spiced and soaked in something earthly…like perfumed soil, rich and damp, sifting through your fingers.

“You stay where you are.” His voice purrs out, like silk curling against your cheek.

He reaches behind you and takes up the small switch. Black and spindly, it could almost pass for a wand, fittingly - for his is nothing short of magic.

“I’d like to look at your cunt right up close while I’m cumming.” he whispers, dropping to his knees. “Hello little beauty,” his breath falls against you, though his words aren’t spoken for your ears. “How’s my sweetness?”

His eyes cast up to yours, “Such a beautiful pussy, magpie. Especially right now. Wet and swollen, pink and velvet soft…what I wouldn’t give to fill her all the way up. Pity.”

His arm begins a rhythmic pump against your calf as he lavishes his devouring gaze between your legs, hushing words of praise meant only for your cunt. Murmurs of, pretty soaked pussy, tight little baby, needs spoiled so badly, curses, groans of pleasure and denial that fall hot between your legs.

When your hands give in and reach to bury in his hair, your thigh is met with a harsh crack of the switch, wordlessly putting you in your place. No touching, that sting barks, and you heed the warning.

His frantic gasps and groans grow louder until, as if he can’t help himself, the flat of his tongue laps slowly and heavily from your slick entrance to your clit…the growl that follows is feral and ravenous for more, but he is nothing if not self-disciplined.

“Needed the taste of you on my tongue,” he’s panting now, jerking his cock hard and fast, and then his mouth is resting upon you, lips and cheek pressed right up against your dripping center as you thrust lightly into him, feverish for even a breath of friction.

He cums hard, shoving in closer and digging into your thigh with his hand that still clutches the switch. Crying out as he grabs and pulls at you, nuzzling into your cunt as he spills all over the floor between his knees and your feet, a chorus of his own gasps and obscenities the soundtrack to his release.

Once he’s regained some semblance of composure, he’s on you. Darting up from his place before you to grab you by the throat, decadent cum still dripping from his knuckles and onto your collarbone. He smears it into your flesh like heavenly oil, anointing you.

“You will wear me tonight and remember who you belong to, and you will fucking thank me for it.” He rasps, crawling over you, guiding you along beneath him until your head meets the pillow.

“Yes.” You nod, wide-eyed and grateful. “Yes. Thank you, sir. I’ll wear you forever. Cover me in you every minute of every day. Please, I want it, always.”

Down his hand slips, weaving a winding, serpentine trail of his release to mark his path, then he finds his spot beside you…pulling you in against him until his softening cock is nestled into the curve of your spine.

He will take care of you in the morning, you know without question…but tonight, this is your punishment, and you are more than willing to take it.

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[takingstockofwhatmattersmost]

Nusta On Watching The Leaves Fall

in the delicate dance of leaves that fall a subtle rebellion stirs each descent ~ a whispered proclamation that even in the hushed surrender there lies an ember yearning to be kindled "ought they not to birth fire from the stoic stone," she says a testament to the unseen sparks within

the world, it seems, hinges on the precipice of our descent as if our fall could orchestrate a universal symphony in solitude, our contemplation becomes an affair of interest to the butterflies delicate creatures entangled in the intricate lace of our musings and there...amidst the lost gold of afternoon rays we find a currency of moments each one more precious than the last

the fawn and cobalt walls witness the fading peaks of ancient volcanoes silent spectators to the eons that have passed sunlight, ever the audacious adventurer plunges beyond the hills awakening leaves to their arboreal reverie it's a waltz with the wind a dance with destiny as the world unfolds in hues of twilight

"to discover, my people, that a world yet remains to be crafted on the canvas of a sunset is a revelation that sobers even the stones" she says the weight of existence lightens and in the quiet surrender of the day we find the brushstrokes to paint our world anew

in the cadence of our presence the verses of life find resonance as the sunGod dips below the horizon know that it is not merely the leaves that fall but the barriers between us and the uncharted realms of passion and possibility our world a canvas of shared dreams awaits the strokes of our creation

[pickl-o]

Oop, forgot to put my signature. Anyway, CHAPTER 1

Loomings

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago–never mind how long precisely– having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off–then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me.

There now is your insular city of the Manhattoes, belted round by wharves as Indian isles by coral reefs–commerce surrounds it with her surf. Right and left, the streets take you waterward. Its extreme downtown is the battery, where that noble mole is washed by waves, and cooled by breezes, which a few hours previous were out of sight of land. Look at the crowds of water-gazers there.

Circumambulate the city of a dreamy Sabbath afternoon. Go from Corlears Hook to Coenties Slip, and from thence, by Whitehall, northward. What do you see?–Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reveries. Some leaning against the spiles; some seated upon the pier-heads; some looking over the bulwarks glasses! of ships from China; some high aloft in the rigging, as if striving to get a still better seaward peep. But these are all landsmen; of week days pent up in lath and plaster– tied to counters, nailed to benches, clinched to desks. How then is this? Are the green fields gone? What do they here?

But look! here come more crowds, pacing straight for the water, and seemingly bound for a dive. Strange! Nothing will content them but the extremest limit of the land; loitering under the shady lee of yonder warehouses will not suffice. No. They must get just as nigh the water as they possibly can without falling in. And there they stand–miles of them–leagues. Inlanders all, they come from lanes and alleys, streets and avenues,– north, east, south, and west. Yet here they all unite. Tell me, does the magnetic virtue of the needles of the compasses of all those ships attract them thither?

Once more. Say you are in the country; in some high land of lakes. Take almost any path you please, and ten to one it carries you down in a dale, and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. There is magic in it. Let the most absent-minded of men be plunged in his deepest reveries–stand that man on his legs, set his feet a-going, and he will infallibly lead you to water, if water there be in all that region. Should you ever be athirst in the great American desert, try this experiment, if your caravan happen to be supplied with a metaphysical professor. Yes, as every one knows, meditation and water are wedded for ever.

But here is an artist. He desires to paint you the dreamiest, shadiest, quietest, most enchanting bit of romantic landscape in all the valley of the Saco. What is the chief element he employs? There stand his trees, each with a hollow trunk, as if a hermit and a crucifix were within; and here sleeps his meadow, and there sleep his cattle; and up from yonder cottage goes a sleepy smoke. Deep into distant woodlands winds a mazy way, reaching to overlapping spurs of mountains bathed in their hill-side blue. But though the picture lies thus tranced, and though this pine-tree shakes down its sighs like leaves upon this shepherd’s head, yet all were vain, unless the shepherd’s eye were fixed upon the magic stream before him. Go visit the Prairies in June, when for scores on scores of miles you wade knee-deep among Tiger-lilies–what is the one charm wanting?– Water there is not a drop of water there! Were Niagara but a cataract of sand, would you travel your thousand miles to see it? Why did the poor poet of Tennessee, upon suddenly receiving two handfuls of silver, deliberate whether to buy him a coat, which he sadly needed, or invest his money in a pedestrian trip to Rockaway Beach? Why is almost every robust healthy boy with a robust healthy soul in him, at some time or other crazy to go to sea? Why upon your first voyage as a passenger, did you yourself feel such a mystical vibration, when first told that you and your ship were now out of sight of land? Why did the old Persians hold the sea holy? Why did the Greeks give it a separate deity, and own brother of Jove? Surely all this is not without meaning. And still deeper the meaning of that story of Narcissus, who because he could not grasp the tormenting, mild image he saw in the fountain, plunged into it and was drowned. But that same image, we ourselves see in all rivers and oceans. It is the image of the ungraspable phantom of life; and this is the key to it all.

Now, when I say that I am in the habit of going to sea whenever I begin to grow hazy about the eyes, and begin to be over conscious of my lungs, I do not mean to have it inferred that I ever go to sea as a passenger. For to go as a passenger you must needs have a purse, and a purse is but a rag unless you have something in it. Besides, passengers get sea-sick– grow quarrelsome–don’t sleep of nights–do not enjoy themselves much, as a general thing;–no, I never go as a passenger; nor, though I am something of a salt, do I ever go to sea as a Commodore, or a Captain, or a Cook. I abandon the glory and distinction of such offices to those who like them. For my part, I abominate all honorable respectable toils, trials, and tribulations of every kind whatsoever. It is quite as much as I can do to take care of myself, without taking care of ships, barques, brigs, schooners, and what not. And as for going as cook,–though I confess there is considerable glory in that, a cook being a sort of officer on ship-board–yet, somehow, I never fancied broiling fowls;–though once broiled, judiciously buttered, and judgmatically salted and peppered, there is no one who will speak more respectfully, not to say reverentially, of a broiled fowl than I will. It is out of the idolatrous dotings of the old Egyptians upon broiled ibis and roasted river horse, that you see the mummies of those creatures in their huge bakehouses the pyramids.

No, when I go to sea, I go as a simple sailor, right before the mast, plumb down into the fore-castle, aloft there to the royal mast-head. True, they rather order me about some, and make me jump from spar to spar, like a grasshopper in a May meadow. And at first, this sort of thing is unpleasant enough. It touches one’s sense of honor, particularly if you come of an old established family in the land, the Van Rensselaers, or Randolphs, or Hardicanutes. And more than all, if just previous to putting your hand into the tar-pot, you have been lording it as a country schoolmaster, making the tallest boys stand in awe of you. The transition is a keen one, I assure you, from a schoolmaster to a sailor, and requires a strong decoction of Seneca and the Stoics to enable you to grin and bear it. But even this wears off in time.

What of it, if some old hunks of a sea-captain orders me to get a broom and sweep down the decks? What does that indignity amount to, weighed, I mean, in the scales of the New Testament? Do you think the archangel Gabriel thinks anything the less of me, because I promptly and respectfully obey that old hunks in that particular instance? Who ain’t a slave? Tell me that. Well, then, however the old sea-captains may order me about–however they may thump and punch me about, I have the satisfaction of knowing that it is all right; that everybody else is one way or other served in much the same way– either in a physical or metaphysical point of view, that is; and so the universal thump is passed round, and all hands should rub each other’s shoulder-blades, and be content.

Again, I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of paying me for my trouble, whereas they never pay passengers a single penny that I ever heard of. On the contrary, passengers themselves must pay. And there is all the difference in the world between paying and being paid. The act of paying is perhaps the most uncomfortable infliction that the two orchard thieves entailed upon us. But being paid,– what will compare with it? The urbane activity with which a man receives money is really marvellous, considering that we so earnestly believe money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no account can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! how cheerfully we consign ourselves to perdition!

Finally, I always go to sea as a sailor, because of the wholesome exercise and pure air of the fore-castle deck. For as in this world, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if you never violate the Pythagorean maxim), so for the most part the Commodore on the quarter-deck gets his atmosphere at second hand from the sailors on the forecastle. He thinks he breathes it first; but not so. In much the same way do the commonalty lead their leaders in many other things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it. But wherefore it was that after having repeatedly smelt the sea as a merchant sailor, I should now take it into my head to go on a whaling voyage; this the invisible police officer of the Fates, who has the constant surveillance of me, and secretly dogs me, and influences me in some unaccountable way– he can better answer than any one else. And, doubtless, my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of the grand programme of Providence that was drawn up a long time ago. It came in as a sort of brief interlude and solo between more extensive performances. I take it that this part of the bill must have run something like this:

“Grand Contested Election for the Presidency of the United States. “WHALING VOYAGE BY ONE ISHMAEL.” “BLOODY BATTLE IN AFFGHANISTAN.”

Though I cannot tell why it was exactly that those stage managers, the Fates, put me down for this shabby part of a whaling voyage, when others were set down for magnificent parts in high tragedies, and short and easy parts in genteel comedies, and jolly parts in farces– though I cannot tell why this was exactly; yet, now that I recall all the circumstances, I think I can see a little into the springs and motives which being cunningly presented to me under various disguises, induced me to set about performing the part I did, besides cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment.

Chief among these motives was the overwhelming idea of the great whale himself. Such a portentous and mysterious monster roused all my curiosity. Then the wild and distant seas where he rolled his island bulk; the undeliverable, nameless perils of the whale; these, with all the attending marvels of a thousand Patagonian sights and sounds, helped to sway me to my wish. With other men, perhaps, such things would not have been inducements; but as for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts. Not ignoring what is good, I am quick to perceive a horror, and could still be social with it–would they let me–since it is but well to be on friendly terms with all the inmates of the place one lodges in.

By reason of these things, then, the whaling voyage was welcome; the great flood-gates of the wonder-world swung open, and in the wild conceits that swayed me to my purpose, two and two there floated into my inmost soul, endless processions of the whale, and, mid most of them all, one grand hooded phantom, like a snow hill in the air.

CHAPTER 2

The Carpet-Bag

I stuffed a shirt or two into my old carpet-bag, tucked it under my arm, and started for Cape Horn and the Pacific. Quitting the good city of old Manhatto, I duly arrived in New Bedford. It was on a Saturday night in December. Much was I disappointed upon learning that the little packet for Nantucket had already sailed, and that no way of reaching that place would offer, till the following Monday.

As most young candidates for the pains and penalties of whaling stop at this same New Bedford, thence to embark on their voyage, it may as well be related that I, for one, had no idea of so doing. For my mind was made up to sail in no other than a Nantucket craft, because there was a fine, boisterous something about everything connected with that famous old island, which amazingly pleased me. Besides though New Bedford has of late been gradually monopolizing the business of whaling, and though in this matter poor old Nantucket is now much behind her, yet Nantucket was her great original– the Tyre of this Carthage;–the place where the first dead American whale was stranded. Where else but from Nantucket did those aboriginal whalemen, the Red-Men, first sally out in canoes to give chase to the Leviathan? And where but from Nantucket, too, did that first adventurous little sloop put forth, partly laden with imported cobblestones–so goes the story– to throw at the whales, in order to discover when they were nigh enough to risk a harpoon from the bowsprit?

Now having a night, a day, and still another night following before me in New Bedford, ere I could embark for my destined port, it became a matter of concernment where I was to eat and sleep meanwhile. It was a very dubious-looking, nay, a very dark and dismal night, bitingly cold and cheerless. I knew no one in the place. With anxious grapnels I had sounded my pocket, and only brought up a few pieces of silver,–So, wherever you go, Ishmael, said I to myself, as I stood in the middle of a dreary street shouldering my bag, and comparing the gloom towards the north with the darkness towards the south–wherever in your wisdom you may conclude to lodge for the night, my dear Ishmael, be sure to inquire the price, and don’t be too particular.

With halting steps I paced the streets, and passed the sign of “The Crossed Harpoons”–but it looked too expensive and jolly there. Further on, from the bright red windows of the “Sword-Fish Inn,” there came such fervent rays, that it seemed to have melted the packed snow and ice from before the house, for everywhere else the congealed frost lay ten inches thick in a hard, asphaltic pavement,–rather weary for me, when I struck my foot against the flinty projections, because from hard, remorseless service the soles of my boots were in a most miserable plight. Too expensive and jolly, again thought I, pausing one moment to watch the broad glare in the street, and hear the sounds of the tinkling glasses within. But go on, Ishmael, said I at last; don’t you hear? get away from before the door; your patched boots are stopping the way. So on I went. I now by instinct followed the streets that took me waterward, for there, doubtless, were the cheapest, if not the cheeriest inns.

Such dreary streets! Blocks of blackness, not houses, on either hand, and here and there a candle, like a candle moving about in a tomb. At this hour of the night, of the last day of the week, that quarter of the town proved all but deserted. But presently I came to a smoky light proceeding from a low, wide building, the door of which stood invitingly open. It had a careless look, as if it were meant for the uses of the public; so, entering, the first thing I did was to stumble over an ash-box in the porch. Ha! thought I, ha, as the flying particles almost choked me, are these ashes from that destroyed city, Gomorrah? But “The Crossed Harpoons,” and the “The Sword-Fish?”–this, then must needs be the sign of “The Trap.” However, I picked myself up and hearing a loud voice within, pushed on and opened a second, interior door.

It seemed the great Black Parliament sitting in Tophet. A hundred black faces turned round in their rows to peer; and beyond, a black Angel of Doom was beating a book in a pulpit. It was a negro church; and the preacher’s text was about the blackness of darkness, and the weeping and wailing and teeth-gnashing there. Ha, Ishmael, muttered I, backing out, Wretched entertainment at the sign of ‘The Trap!’

Moving on, I at last came to a dim sort of light not far from the docks, and heard a forlorn creaking in the air; and looking up, saw a swinging sign over the door with a white painting upon it, faintly representing a tall straight jet of misty spray, and these words underneath–“The Spouter Inn:–Peter Coffin.”

Coffin?–Spouter?–Rather ominous in that particular connexion, thought I. But it is a common name in Nantucket, they say, and I suppose this Peter here is an emigrant from there. As the light looked so dim, and the place, for the time, looked quiet enough, and the dilapidated little wooden house itself looked as if it might have been carted here from the ruins of some burnt district, and as the swinging sign had a poverty-stricken sort of creak to it, I thought that here was the very spot for cheap lodgings, and the best of pea coffee.

It was a queer sort of place–a gable-ended old house, one side palsied as it were, and leaning over sadly. It stood on a sharp bleak corner, where that tempestuous wind Euroclydon kept up a worse howling than ever it did about poor Paul’s tossed craft. Euroclydon, nevertheless, is a mighty pleasant zephyr to any one in-doors, with his feet on the hob quietly toasting for bed. In judging of that tempestuous wind called Euroclydon,” says an old writer–of whose works I possess the only copy extant–“it maketh a marvellous difference, whether thou lookest out at it from a glass window where the frost is all on the outside, or whether thou observest it from that sashless window, where the frost is on both sides, and of which the wight Death is the only glazier.” True enough, thought I, as this passage occurred to my mind–old black-letter, thou reasonest well. Yes, these eyes are windows, and this body of mine is the house. What a pity they didn’t stop up the chinks and the crannies though, and thrust in a little lint here and there. But it’s too late to make any improvements now. The universe is finished; the copestone is on, and the chips were carted off a million years ago. Poor Lazarus there, chattering his teeth against the curbstone for his pillow, and shaking off his tatters with his shiverings, he might plug up both ears with rags, and put a corn-cob into his mouth, and yet that would not keep out the tempestuous Euroclydon. Euroclydon! says old Dives, in his red silken wrapper–(he had a redder one afterwards) pooh, pooh! What a fine frosty night; how Orion glitters; what northern lights! Let them talk of their oriental summer climes of everlasting conservatories; give me the privilege of making my own summer with my own coals.

But what thinks Lazarus? Can he warm his blue hands by holding them up to the grand northern lights? Would not Lazarus rather be in Sumatra than here? Would he not far rather lay him down lengthwise along the line of the equator; yea, ye gods! go down to the fiery pit itself, in order to keep out this frost?

Now, that Lazarus should lie stranded there on the curbstone before the door of Dives, this is more wonderful than that an iceberg should be moored to one of the Moluccas. Yet Dives himself, he too lives like a Czar in an ice palace made of frozen sighs, and being a president of a temperance society, he only drinks the tepid tears of orphans.

But no more of this blubbering now, we are going a-whaling, and there is plenty of that yet to come. Let us scrape the ice from our frosted feet, and see what sort of a place this “Spouter” may be.

CHAPTER 3

The Spouter-Inn

Entering that gable-ended Spouter-Inn, you found yourself in a wide, low, straggling entry with old-fashioned wainscots, reminding one of the bulwarks of some condemned old craft. On one side hung a very large oil painting so thoroughly besmoked, and every way defaced, that in the unequal crosslights by which you viewed it, it was only by diligent study and a series of systematic visits to it, and careful inquiry of the neighbors, that you could any way arrive at an understanding of its purpose. Such unaccountable masses of shades and shadows, that at first you almost thought some ambitious young artist, in the time of the New England hags, had endeavored to delineate chaos bewitched. But by dint of much and earnest contemplation, and oft repeated ponderings, and especially by throwing open the little window towards the back of the entry, you at last come to the conclusion that such an idea, however wild, might not be altogether unwarranted.

But what most puzzled and confounded you was a long, limber, portentous, black mass of something hovering in the centre of the picture over three blue, dim, perpendicular lines floating in a nameless yeast. A boggy, soggy, squitchy picture truly, enough to drive a nervous man distracted. Yet was there a sort of indefinite, half-attained, unimaginable sublimity about it that fairly froze you to it, till you involuntarily took an oath with yourself to find out what that marvellous painting meant. Ever and anon a bright, but, alas, deceptive idea would dart you through.– It’s the Black Sea in a midnight gale.–It’s the unnatural combat of the four primal elements.–It’s a blasted heath.– It’s a Hyperborean winter scene.–It’s the breaking-up of the icebound stream of Time. But at last all these fancies yielded to that one portentous something in the picture’s midst. That once found out, and all the rest were plain. But stop; does it not bear a faint resemblance to a gigantic fish? even the great leviathan himself?

In fact, the artist’s design seemed this: a final theory of my own, partly based upon the aggregated opinions of many aged persons with whom I conversed upon the subject. The picture represents a Cape-Horner in a great hurricane; the half-foundered ship weltering there with its three dismantled masts alone visible; and an exasperated whale, purposing to spring clean over the craft, is in the enormous act of impaling himself upon the three mast-heads.

The opposite wall of this entry was hung all over with a heathenish array of monstrous clubs and spears. Some were thickly set with glittering teeth resembling ivory saws; others were tufted with knots of human hair; and one was sickle-shaped, with a vast handle sweeping round like the segment made in the new-mown grass by a long-armed mower. You shuddered as you gazed, and wondered what monstrous cannibal and savage could ever have gone a death-harvesting with such a hacking, horrifying implement. Mixed with these were rusty old whaling lances and harpoons all broken and deformed. Some were storied weapons. With this once long lance, now wildly elbowed, fifty years ago did Nathan Swain kill fifteen whales between a sunrise and a sunset. And that harpoon–so like a corkscrew now–was flung in Javan seas, and run away with by a whale, years afterwards slain off the Cape of Blanco. The original iron entered nigh the tail, and, like a restless needle sojourning in the body of a man, travelled full forty feet, and at last was found imbedded in the hump.

Crossing this dusky entry, and on through yon low-arched way– cut through what in old times must have been a great central chimney with fireplaces all round–you enter the public room. A still duskier place is this, with such low ponderous beams above, and such old wrinkled planks beneath, that you would almost fancy you trod some old craft’s cockpits, especially of such a howling night, when this corner-anchored old ark rocked so furiously. On one side stood a long, low, shelf-like table covered with cracked glass cases, filled with dusty rarities gathered from this wide world’s remotest nooks. Projecting from the further angle of the room stands a dark-looking den–the bar–a rude attempt at a right whale’s head. Be that how it may, there stands the vast arched bone of the whale’s jaw, so wide, a coach might almost drive beneath it. Within are shabby shelves, ranged round with old decanters, bottles, flasks; and in those jaws of swift destruction, like another cursed Jonah (by which name indeed they called him), bustles a little withered old man, who, for their money, dearly sells the sailors deliriums and death.

Abominable are the tumblers into which he pours his poison. Though true cylinders without–within, the villanous green goggling glasses deceitfully tapered downwards to a cheating bottom. Parallel meridians rudely pecked into the glass, surround these footpads’ goblets. Fill to this mark, and your charge is but a penny; to this a penny more; and so on to the full glass– the Cape Horn measure, which you may gulp down for a shilling.

Upon entering the place I found a number of young seamen gathered about a table, examining by a dim light divers specimens of skrimshander. I sought the landlord, and telling him I desired to be accommodated with a room, received for answer that his house was full– not a bed unoccupied. “But avast,” he added, tapping his forehead, “you haint no objections to sharing a harpooneer’s blanket, have ye? I s’pose you are goin’ a-whalin’, so you’d better get used to that sort of thing.”

I told him that I never liked to sleep two in a bed; that if I should ever do so, it would depend upon who the harpooneer might be, and that if he (the landlord) really had no other place for me, and the harpooneer was not decidedly objectionable, why rather than wander further about a strange town on so bitter a night, I would put up with the half of any decent man’s blanket.

“I thought so. All right; take a seat. Supper?–you want supper? Supper’ll be ready directly.”

I sat down on an old wooden settle, carved all over like a bench on the Battery. At one end a ruminating tar was still further adorning it with his jack-knife, stooping over and diligently working away at the space between his legs. He was trying his hand at a ship under full sail, but he didn’t make much headway, I thought.

At last some four or five of us were summoned to our meal in an adjoining room. It was cold as Iceland– no fire at all–the landlord said he couldn’t afford it. Nothing but two dismal tallow candles, each in a winding sheet. We were fain to button up our monkey jackets, and hold to our lips cups of scalding tea with our half frozen fingers. But the fare was of the most substantial kind–not only meat and potatoes, but dumplings; good heavens! dumplings for supper! One young fellow in a green box coat, addressed himself to these dumplings in a most direful manner.

“My boy,” said the landlord, “you’ll have the nightmare to a dead sartainty.”

“Landlord,” I whispered, “that aint the harpooneer is it?”

“Oh, no,” said he, looking a sort of diabolically funny, “the harpooneer is a dark complexioned chap. He never eats dumplings, he don’t– he eats nothing but steaks, and he likes ’em rare.”

“The devil he does,” says I. “Where is that harpooneer? Is he here?”

“He’ll be here afore long,” was the answer.

I could not help it, but I began to feel suspicious of this “dark complexioned” harpooneer. At any rate, I made up my mind that if it so turned out that we should sleep together, he must undress and get into bed before I did.

Supper over, the company went back to the bar-room, when, knowing not what else to do with myself, I resolved to spend the rest of the evening as a looker on.

Presently a rioting noise was heard without. Starting up, the landlord cried, “That’s the Grampus’s crew. I seed her reported in the offing this morning; a three years’ voyage, and a full ship. Hurrah, boys; now we’ll have the latest news from the Feegees.”

A tramping of sea boots was heard in the entry; the door was flung open, and in rolled a wild set of mariners enough. Enveloped in their shaggy watch coats, and with their heads muffled in woollen comforters, all bedarned and ragged, and their beards stiff with icicles, they seemed an eruption of bears from Labrador. They had just landed from their boat, and this was the first house they entered. No wonder, then, that they made a straight wake for the whale’s mouth– the bar–when the wrinkled little old Jonah, there officiating, soon poured them out brimmers all round. One complained of a bad cold in his head, upon which Jonah mixed him a pitch-like potion of gin and molasses, which he swore was a sovereign cure for all colds and catarrhs whatsoever, never mind of how long standing, or whether caught off the coast of Labrador, or on the weather side of an ice-island.

The liquor soon mounted into their heads, as it generally does even with the arrantest topers newly landed from sea, and they began capering about most obstreperously.

I observed, however, that one of them held somewhat aloof, and though he seemed desirous not to spoil the hilarity of his shipmates by his own sober face, yet upon the whole he refrained from making as much noise as the rest. This man interested me at once; and since the sea-gods had ordained that he should soon become my shipmate (though but a sleeping partner one, so far as this narrative is concerned), I will here venture upon a little description of him. He stood full six feet in height, with noble shoulders, and a chest like a coffer-dam. I have seldom seen such brawn in a man. His face was deeply brown and burnt, making his white teeth dazzling by the contrast; while in the deep shadows of his eyes floated some reminiscences that did not seem to give him much joy. His voice at once announced that he was a Southerner, and from his fine stature, I thought he must be one of those tall mountaineers from the Alleghanian Ridge in Virginia. When the revelry of his companions had mounted to its height, this man slipped away unobserved, and I saw no more of him till he became my comrade on the sea. In a few minutes, however, he was missed by his shipmates, and being, it seems, for some reason a huge favorite with them, they raised a cry of “Bulkington! Bulkington! where’s Bulkington?” and darted out of the house in pursuit of him.

It was now about nine o’clock, and the room seeming almost supernaturally quiet after these orgies, I began to congratulate myself upon a little plan that had occurred to me just previous to the entrance of the seamen.

No man prefers to sleep two in a bed. In fact, you would a good deal rather not sleep with your own brother. I don’t know how it is, but people like to be private when they are sleeping. And when it comes to sleeping with an unknown stranger, in a strange inn, in a strange town, and that stranger a harpooneer, then your objections indefinitely multiply. Nor was there any earthly reason why I as a sailor should sleep two in a bed, more than anybody else; for sailors no more sleep two in a bed at sea, than bachelor Kings do ashore. To be sure they all sleep together in one apartment, but you have your own hammock, and cover yourself with your own blanket, and sleep in your own skin.

The more I pondered over this harpooneer, the more I abominated the thought of sleeping with him. It was fair to presume that being a harpooneer, his linen or woollen, as the case might be, would not be of the tidiest, certainly none of the finest. I began to twitch all over. Besides, it was getting late, and my decent harpooneer ought to be home and going bedwards. Suppose now, he should tumble in upon me at midnight– how could I tell from what vile hole he had been coming?

“Landlord! I’ve changed my mind about that harpooneer.– I shan’t sleep with him. I’ll try the bench here.”

“Just as you please; I’m sorry I cant spare ye a tablecloth for a mattress, and it’s a plaguy rough board here”–feeling of the knots and notches. “But wait a bit, Skrimshander; I’ve got a carpenter’s plane there in the bar–wait, I say, and I’ll make ye snug enough.” So saying he procured the plane; and with his old silk handkerchief first dusting the bench, vigorously set to planing away at my bed, the while grinning like an ape. The shavings flew right and left; till at last the plane-iron came bump against an indestructible knot. The landlord was near spraining his wrist, and I told him for heaven’s sake to quit–the bed was soft enough to suit me, and I did not know how all the planing in the world could make eider down of a pine plank. So gathering up the shavings with another grin, and throwing them into the great stove in the middle of the room, he went about his business, and left me in a brown study.

I now took the measure of the bench, and found that it was a foot too short; but that could be mended with a chair. But it was a foot too narrow, and the other bench in the room was about four inches higher than the planed one– so there was no yoking them. I then placed the first bench lengthwise along the only clear space against the wall, leaving a little interval between, for my back to settle down in. But I soon found that there came such a draught of cold air over me from under the sill of the window, that this plan would never do at all, especially as another current from the rickety door met the one from the window, and both together formed a series of small whirlwinds in the immediate vicinity of the spot where I had thought to spend the night.

The devil fetch that harpooneer, thought I, but stop, couldn’t I steal a march on him–bolt his door inside, and jump into his bed, not to be wakened by the most violent knockings? It seemed no bad idea but upon second thoughts I dismissed it. For who could tell but what the next morning, so soon as I popped out of the room, the harpooneer might be standing in the entry, all ready to knock me down!

Still looking around me again, and seeing no possible chance of spending a sufferable night unless in some other person’s bed, I began to think that after all I might be cherishing unwarrantable prejudices against this unknown harpooneer. Thinks I, I’ll wait awhile; he must be dropping in before long. I’ll have a good look at him then, and perhaps we may become jolly good bedfellows after all–there’s no telling.

But though the other boarders kept coming in by ones, twos, and threes, and going to bed, yet no sign of my harpooneer.

“Landlord! said I, “what sort of a chap is he–does he always keep such late hours?” It was now hard upon twelve o’clock.

The landlord chuckled again with his lean chuckle, and seemed to be mightily tickled at something beyond my comprehension. “No,” he answered, “generally he’s an early bird–airley to bed and airley to rise–yea, he’s the bird what catches the worm. But to-night he went out a peddling, you see, and I don’t see what on airth keeps him so late, unless, may be, he can’t sell his head.”

“Can’t sell his head?–What sort of a bamboozingly story is this you are telling me?” getting into a towering rage. “Do you pretend to say, landlord, that this harpooneer is actually engaged this blessed Saturday night, or rather Sunday morning, in peddling his head around this town?”

“That’s precisely it,” said the landlord, “and I told him he couldn’t sell it here, the market’s overstocked.”

“With what?” shouted I.

“With heads to be sure; ain’t there too many heads in the world?”

“I tell you what it is, landlord,” said I quite calmly, “you’d better stop spinning that yarn to me–I’m not green.”

“May be not,” taking out a stick and whittling a toothpick, “but I rayther guess you’ll be done brown if that ere harpooneer hears you a slanderin’ his head.”

“I’ll break it for him,” said I, now flying into a passion again at this unaccountable farrago of the landlord’s.

“It’s broke a’ready,” said he.

“Broke,” said I–“broke, do you mean?”

“Sartain, and that’s the very reason he can’t sell it, I guess.”

“Landlord,” said I, going up to him as cool as Mt. Hecla in a snowstorm–“landlord, stop whittling. You and I must understand one another, and that too without delay. I come to your house and want a bed; you tell me you can only give me half a one; that the other half belongs to a certain harpooneer. And about this harpooneer, whom I have not yet seen, you persist in telling me the most mystifying and exasperating stories tending to beget in me an uncomfortable feeling towards the man whom you design for my bedfellow–a sort of connexion, landlord, which is an intimate and confidential one in the highest degree. I now demand of you to speak out and tell me who and what this harpooneer is, and whether I shall be in all respects safe to spend the night with him. And in the first place, you will be so good as to unsay that story about selling his head, which if true I take to be good evidence that this harpooneer is stark mad, and I’ve no idea of sleeping with a madman; and you, sir, you I mean, landlord, you, sir, by trying to induce me to do so knowingly would thereby render yourself liable to a criminal prosecution.”

“Wall,” said the landlord, fetching a long breath, “that’s a purty long sarmon for a chap that rips a little now and then. But be easy, be easy, this here harpooneer I have been tellin’ you of has just arrived from the south seas, where he bought up a lot of ‘balmed New Zealand heads (great curios, you know), and he’s sold all on ’em but one, and that one he’s trying to sell to-night, cause to-morrow’s Sunday, and it would not do to be sellin’ human heads about the streets when folks is goin’ to churches. He wanted to last Sunday, but I stopped him just as he was goin’ out of the door with four heads strung on a string, for all the airth like a string of inions.”

This account cleared up the otherwise unaccountable mystery, and showed that the landlord, after all, had had no idea of fooling me– but at the same time what could I think of a harpooneer who stayed out of a Saturday night clean into the holy Sabbath, engaged in such a cannibal business as selling the heads of dead idolators?

“Depend upon it, landlord, that harpooneer is a dangerous man.”

“He pays reg’lar,” was the rejoinder. “But come, it’s getting dreadful late, you had better be turning flukes–it’s a nice bed: Sal and me slept in that ere bed the night we were spliced. There’s plenty of room for two to kick about in that bed; it’s an almighty big bed that. Why, afore we give it up, Sal used to put our Sam and little Johnny in the foot of it. But I got a dreaming and sprawling about one night, and somehow, Sam got pitched on the floor, and came near breaking his arm. After that, Sal said it wouldn’t do. Come along here, I’ll give ye a glim in a jiffy;” and so saying he lighted a candle and held it towards me, offering to lead the way. But I stood irresolute; when looking at a clock in the corner, he exclaimed “I vum it’s Sunday–you won’t see that harpooneer to-night; he’s come to anchor somewhere–come along then; do come; won’t ye come?”

I considered the matter a moment, and then up stairs we went, and I was ushered into a small room, cold as a clam, and furnished, sure enough, with a prodigious bed, almost big enough indeed for any four harpooneers to sleep abreast.

“There,” said the landlord, placing the candle on a crazy old sea chest that did double duty as a wash-stand and centre table; “there, make yourself comfortable now; and good night to ye.” I turned round from eyeing the bed, but he had disappeared.

Folding back the counterpane, I stooped over the bed. Though none of the most elegant, it yet stood the scrutiny tolerably well. I then glanced round the room; and besides the bedstead and centre table, could see no other furniture belonging to the place, but a rude shelf, the four walls, and a papered fireboard representing a man striking a whale. Of things not properly belonging to the room, there was a hammock lashed up, and thrown upon the floor in one corner; also a large seaman’s bag, containing the harpooneer’s wardrobe, no doubt in lieu of a land trunk. Likewise, there was a parcel of outlandish bone fish hooks on the shelf over the fire-place, and a tall harpoon standing at the head of the bed.

But what is this on the chest? I took it up, and held it close to the light, and felt it, and smelt it, and tried every way possible to arrive at some satisfactory conclusion concerning it. I can compare it to nothing but a large door mat, ornamented at the edges with little tinkling tags something like the stained porcupine quills round an Indian moccasin. There was a hole or slit in the middle of this mat, as you see the same in South American ponchos. But could it be possible that any sober harpooneer would get into a door mat, and parade the streets of any Christian town in that sort of guise? I put it on, to try it, and it weighed me down like a hamper, being uncommonly shaggy and thick, and I thought a little damp, as though this mysterious harpooneer had been wearing it of a rainy day. I went up in it to a bit of glass stuck against the wall, and I never saw such a sight in my life. I tore myself out of it in such a hurry that I gave myself a kink in the neck.

I sat down on the side of the bed, and commenced thinking about this head-peddling harpooneer, and his door mat. After thinking some time on the bed-side, I got up and took off my monkey jacket, and then stood in the middle of the room thinking. I then took off my coat, and thought a little more in my shirt sleeves. But beginning to feel very cold now, half undressed as I was, and remembering what the landlord said about the harpooneer’s not coming home at all that night, it being so very late, I made no more ado, but jumped out of my pantaloons and boots, and then blowing out the light tumbled into bed, and commended myself to the care of heaven.

Whether that mattress was stuffed with corncobs or broken crockery, there is no telling, but I rolled about a good deal, and could not sleep for a long time. At last I slid off into a light doze, and had pretty nearly made a good offing towards the land of Nod, when I heard a heavy footfall in the passage, and saw a glimmer of light come into the room from under the door.

Lord save me, thinks I, that must be the harpooneer, the infernal head-peddler. But I lay perfectly still, and resolved not to say a word till spoken to. Holding a light in one hand, and that identical New Zealand head in the other, the stranger entered the room, and without looking towards the bed, placed his candle a good way off from me on the floor in one corner, and then began working away at the knotted cords of the large bag I before spoke of as being in the room. I was all eagerness to see his face, but he kept it averted for some time while employed in unlacing the bag’s mouth. This accomplished, however, he turned round–when, good heavens; what a sight! Such a face! It was of a dark, purplish, yellow color, here and there stuck over with large blackish looking squares. Yes, it’s just as I thought, he’s a terrible bedfellow; he’s been in a fight, got dreadfully cut, and here he is, just from the surgeon. But at that moment he chanced to turn his face so towards the light, that I plainly saw they could not be sticking-plasters at all, those black squares on his cheeks. They were stains of some sort or other. At first I knew not what to make of this; but soon an inkling of the truth occurred to me. I remembered a story of a white man–a whaleman too– who, falling among the cannibals, had been tattooed by them. I concluded that this harpooneer, in the course of his distant voyages, must have met with a similar adventure. And what is it, thought I, after all! It’s only his outside; a man can be honest in any sort of skin. But then, what to make of his unearthly complexion, that part of it, I mean, lying round about, and completely independent of the squares of tattooing. To be sure, it might be nothing but a good coat of tropical tanning; but I never heard of a hot sun’s tanning a white man into a purplish yellow one. However, I had never been in the South Seas; and perhaps the sun there produced these extraordinary effects upon the skin. Now, while all these ideas were passing through me like lightning, this harpooneer never noticed me at all. But, after some difficulty having opened his bag, he commenced fumbling in it, and presently pulled out a sort of tomahawk, and a seal-skin wallet with the hair on. Placing these on the old chest in the middle of the room, he then took the New Zealand head–a ghastly thing enough– and crammed it down into the bag. He now took off his hat– a new beaver hat–when I came nigh singing out with fresh surprise. There was no hair on his head–none to speak of at least– nothing but a small scalp-knot twisted up on his forehead. His bald purplish head now looked for all the world like a mildewed skull. Had not the stranger stood between me and the door, I would have bolted out of it quicker than ever I bolted a dinner.

Even as it was, I thought something of slipping out of the window, but it was the second floor back. I am no coward, but what to make of this headpeddling purple rascal altogether passed my comprehension. Ignorance is the parent of fear, and being completely nonplussed and confounded about the stranger, I confess I was now as much afraid of him as if it was the devil himself who had thus broken into my room at the dead of night. In fact, I was so afraid of him that I was not game enough just then to address him, and demand a satisfactory answer concerning what seemed inexplicable in him.

Meanwhile, he continued the business of undressing, and at last showed his chest and arms. As I live, these covered parts of him were checkered with the same squares as his face, his back, too, was all over the same dark squares; he seemed to have been in a Thirty Years’ War, and just escaped from it with a sticking-plaster shirt. Still more, his very legs were marked, as if a parcel of dark green frogs were running up the trunks of young palms. It was now quite plain that he must be some abominable savage or other shipped aboard of a whaleman in the South Seas, and so landed in this Christian country. I quaked to think of it. A peddler of heads too–perhaps the heads of his own brothers. He might take a fancy to mine–heavens! look at that tomahawk!

But there was no time for shuddering, for now the savage went about something that completely fascinated my attention, and convinced me that he must indeed be a heathen. Going to his heavy grego, or wrapall, or dreadnaught, which he had previously hung on a chair, he fumbled in the pockets, and produced at length a curious little deformed image with a hunch on its back, and exactly the color of a three days’ old Congo baby. Remembering the embalmed head, at first I almost thought that this black manikin was a real baby preserved in some similar manner. But seeing that it was not at all limber, and that it glistened a good deal like polished ebony, I concluded that it must be nothing but a wooden idol, which indeed it proved to be. For now the savage goes up to the empty fire-place, and removing the papered fire-board, sets up this little hunch-backed image, like a tenpin, between the andirons. The chimney jambs and all the bricks inside were very sooty, so that I thought this fire-place made a very appropriate little shrine or chapel for his Congo idol.

I now screwed my eyes hard towards the half hidden image, feeling but ill at ease meantime–to see what was next to follow. First he takes about a double handful of shavings out of his grego pocket, and places them carefully before the idol; then laying a bit of ship biscuit on top and applying the flame from the lamp, he kindled the shavings into a sacrificial blaze. Presently, after many hasty snatches into the fire, and still hastier withdrawals of his fingers (whereby he seemed to be scorching them badly), he at last succeeded in drawing out the biscuit; then blowing off the heat and ashes a little, he made a polite offer of it to the little negro. But the little devil did not seem to fancy such dry sort of fare at all; he never moved his lips. All these strange antics were accompanied by still stranger guttural noises from the devotee, who seemed to be praying in a sing-song or else singing some pagan psalmody or other, during which his face twitched about in the most unnatural manner. At last extinguishing the fire, he took the idol up very unceremoniously, and bagged it again in his grego pocket as carelessly as if he were a sportsman bagging a dead woodcock.

All these queer proceedings increased my uncomfortableness, and seeing him now exhibiting strong symptoms of concluding his business operations, and jumping into bed with me, I thought it was high time, now or never, before the light was put out, to break the spell in which I had so long been bound.

But the interval I spent in deliberating what to say, was a fatal one. Taking up his tomahawk from the table, he examined the head of it for an instant, and then holding it to the light, with his mouth at the handle, he puffed out great clouds of tobacco smoke. The next moment the light was extinguished, and this wild cannibal, tomahawk between his teeth, sprang into bed with me. I sang out, I could not help it now; and giving a sudden grunt of astonishment he began feeling me.

Stammering out something, I knew not what, I rolled away from him against the wall, and then conjured him, whoever or whatever he might be, to keep quiet, and let me get up and light the lamp again. But his guttural responses satisfied me at once that he but ill comprehended my meaning.

“Who-e debel you?”–he at last said–“you no speak-e, dam-me, I kill-e.” And so saying the lighted tomahawk began flourishing about me in the dark.

“Landlord, for God’s sake, Peter Coffin!” shouted I. “Landlord! Watch! Coffin! Angels! save me!”

“Speak-e! tell-ee me who-ee be, or dam-me, I kill-e!” again growled the cannibal, while his horrid flourishings of the tomahawk scattered the hot tobacco ashes about me till I thought my linen would get on fire. But thank heaven, at that moment the landlord came into the room light in hand, and leaping from the bed I ran up to him.

“Don’t be afraid now,” said he, grinning again, “Queequeg here wouldn’t harm a hair of your head.”

“Stop your grinning,” shouted I, “and why didn’t you tell me that that infernal harpooneer was a cannibal?”

“I thought ye know’d it;–didn’t I tell ye, he was a peddlin’ heads around town?–but turn flukes again and go to sleep. Queequeg, look here–you sabbee me, I sabbee–you this man sleepe you–you sabbee?”

“Me sabbee plenty”–grunted Queequeg, puffing away at his pipe and sitting up in bed.

“You gettee in,” he added, motioning to me with his tomahawk, and throwing the clothes to one side. He really did this in not only a civil but a really kind and charitable way. I stood looking at him a moment. For all his tattooings he was on the whole a clean, comely looking cannibal. What’s all this fuss I have been making about, thought I to myself–the man’s a human being just as I am: he has just as much reason to fear me, as I have to be afraid of him. Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.

“Landlord,” said I, “tell him to stash his tomahawk there, or pipe, or whatever you call it; tell him to stop smoking, in short, and I will turn in with him. But I don’t fancy having a man smoking in bed with me. It’s dangerous. Besides, I ain’t insured.”

This being told to Queequeg, he at once complied, and again politely motioned me to get into bed–rolling over to one side as much as to say– I won’t touch a leg of ye.”

“Good night, landlord,” said I, “you may go.”

I turned in, and never slept better in my life.

CHAPTER 4

The Counterpane

Upon waking next morning about daylight, I found Queequeg’s arm thrown over me in the most loving and affectionate manner. You had almost thought I had been his wife. The counterpane was of patchwork, full of odd little parti-colored squares and triangles; and this arm of his tattooed all over with an interminable Cretan labyrinth of a figure, no two parts of which were of one precise shade– owing I suppose to his keeping his arm at sea unmethodically in sun and shade, his shirt sleeves irregularly rolled up at various times– this same arm of his, I say, looked for all the world like a strip of that same patchwork quilt. Indeed, partly lying on it as the arm did when I first awoke, I could hardly tell it from the quilt, they so blended their hues together; and it was only by the sense of weight and pressure that I could tell that Queequeg was hugging me.

My sensations were strange. Let me try to explain them. When I was a child, I well remember a somewhat similar circumstance that befell me; whether it was a reality or a dream, I never could entirely settle. The circumstance was this. I had been cutting up some caper or other– I think it was trying to crawl up the chimney, as I had seen a little sweep do a few days previous; and my stepmother who, somehow or other, was all the time whipping me, or sending me to bed supperless,– my mother dragged me by the legs out of the chimney and packed me off to bed, though it was only two o’clock in the afternoon of the 21st June, the longest day in the year in our hemisphere. I felt dreadfully. But there was no help for it, so up stairs I went to my little room in the third floor, undressed myself as slowly as possible so as to kill time, and with a bitter sigh got between the sheets.

I lay there dismally calculating that sixteen entire hours must elapse before I could hope for a resurrection. Sixteen hours in bed! the small of my back ached to think of it. And it was so light too; the sun shining in at the window, and a great rattling of coaches in the streets, and the sound of gay voices all over the house. I felt worse and worse– at last I got up, dressed, and softly going down in my stockinged feet, sought out my stepmother, and suddenly threw myself at her feet, beseeching her as a particular favor to give me a good slippering for my misbehaviour: anything indeed but condemning me to lie abed such an unendurable length of time. But she was the best and most conscientious of stepmothers, and back I had to go to my room. For several hours I lay there broad awake, feeling a great deal worse than I have ever done since, even from the greatest subsequent misfortunes. At last I must have fallen into a troubled nightmare of a doze; and slowly waking from it–half steeped in dreams–I opened my eyes, and the before sunlit room was now wrapped in outer darkness. Instantly I felt a shock running through all my frame; nothing was to be seen, and nothing was to be heard; but a supernatural hand seemed placed in mine. My arm hung over the counterpane, and the nameless, unimaginable, silent form or phantom, to which the hand belonged, seemed closely seated by my bed-side. For what seemed ages piled on ages, I lay there, frozen with the most awful fears, not daring to drag away my hand; yet ever thinking that if I could but stir it one single inch, the horrid spell would be broken. I knew not how this consciousness at last glided away from me; but waking in the morning, I shudderingly remembered it all, and for days and weeks and months afterwards I lost myself in confounding attempts to explain the mystery. Nay, to this very hour, I often puzzle myself with it.

Now, take away the awful fear, and my sensations at feeling the supernatural hand in mine were very similar, in their strangeness, to those which I experienced on waking up and seeing Queequeg’s pagan arm thrown round me. But at length all the past night’s events soberly recurred, one by one, in fixed reality, and then I lay only alive to the comical predicament. For though I tried to move his arm– unlock his bridegroom clasp–yet, sleeping as he was, he still hugged me tightly, as though naught but death should part us twain. I now strove to rouse him–“Queequeg!”–but his only answer was a snore. I then rolled over, my neck feeling as if it were in a horse-collar; and suddenly felt a slight scratch. Throwing aside the counterpane, there lay the tomahawk sleeping by the savage’s side, as if it were a hatchet-faced baby. A pretty pickle, truly, thought I; abed here in a strange house in the broad day, with a cannibal and a tomahawk! “Queequeg!–in the name of goodness, Queequeg, wake!” At length, by dint of much wriggling, and loud and incessant expostulations upon the unbecomingness of his hugging a fellow male in that matrimonial sort of style, I succeeded in extracting a grunt; and presently, he drew back his arm, shook himself all over like a Newfoundland dog just from the water, and sat up in bed, stiff as a pike-staff, looking at me, and rubbing his eyes as if he did not altogether remember how I came to be there, though a dim consciousness of knowing something about me seemed slowly dawning over him. Meanwhile, I lay quietly eyeing him, having no serious misgivings now, and bent upon narrowly observing so curious a creature. When, at last, his mind seemed made up touching the character of his bedfellow, and he became, as it were, reconciled to the fact; he jumped out upon the floor, and by certain signs and sounds gave me to understand that, if it pleased me, he would dress first and then leave me to dress afterwards, leaving the whole apartment to myself. Thinks I, Queequeg, under the circumstances, this is a very civilized overture; but, the truth is, these savages have an innate sense of delicacy, say what you will; it is marvellous how essentially polite they are. I pay this particular compliment to Queequeg, because he treated me with so much civility and consideration, while I was guilty of great rudeness; staring at him from the bed, and watching all his toilette motions; for the time my curiosity getting the better of my breeding. Nevertheless, a man like Queequeg you don’t see every day, he and his ways were well worth unusual regarding.

He commenced dressing at top by donning his beaver hat, a very tall one, by the by, and then–still minus his trowsers– he hunted up his boots. What under the heavens he did it for, I cannot tell, but his next movement was to crush himself– boots in hand, and hat on–under the bed; when, from sundry violent gaspings and strainings, I inferred he was hard at work booting himself; though by no law of propriety that I ever heard of, is any man required to be private when putting on his boots. But Queequeg, do you see, was a creature in the transition state– neither caterpillar nor butterfly. He was just enough civilized to show off his outlandishness in the strangest possible manner. His education was not yet completed. He was an undergraduate. If he had not been a small degree civilized, he very probably would not have troubled himself with boots at all; but then, if he had not been still a savage, he never would have dreamt of getting under the bed to put them on. At last, he emerged with his hat very much dented and crushed down over his eyes, and began creaking and limping about the room, as if, not being much accustomed to boots, his pair of damp, wrinkled cowhide ones– probably not made to order either–rather pinched and tormented him at the first go off of a bitter cold morning.

Seeing, now, that there were no curtains to the window, and that the street being very narrow, the house opposite commanded a plain view into the room, and observing more and more the indecorous figure that Queequeg made, staving about with little else but his hat and boots on; I begged him as well as I could, to accelerate his toilet somewhat, and particularly to get into his pantaloons as soon as possible. He complied, and then proceeded to wash himself. At that time in the morning any Christian would have washed his face; but Queequeg, to my amazement, contented himself with restricting his ablutions to his chest, arms, and hands. He then donned his waistcoat, and taking up a piece of hard soap on the wash-stand centre table, dipped it into water and commenced lathering his face. I was watching to see where he kept his razor, when lo and behold, he takes the harpoon from the bed corner, slips out the long wooden stock, unsheathes the head, whets it a little on his boot, and striding up to the bit of mirror against the wall, begins a vigorous scraping, or rather harpooning of his cheeks. Thinks I, Queequeg, this is using Rogers’s best cutlery with a vengeance. Afterwards I wondered the less at this operation when I came to know of what fine steel the head of a harpoon is made, and how exceedingly sharp the long straight edges are always kept.

The rest of his toilet was soon achieved, and he proudly marched out of the room, wrapped up in his great pilot monkey jacket, and sporting his harpoon like a marshal’s baton.

CHAPTER 5

Breakfast

I quickly followed suit, and descending into the bar-room accosted the grinning landlord very pleasantly. I cherished no malice towards him, though he had been skylarking with me not a little in the matter of my bedfellow.

However, a good laugh is a mighty good thing, and rather too scarce a good thing; the more’s the pity. So, if any one man, in his own proper person, afford stuff for a good joke to anybody, let him not be backward, but let him cheerfully allow himself to spend and to be spent in that way. And the man that has anything bountifully laughable about him, be sure there is more in that man than you perhaps think for.

The bar-room was now full of the boarders who had been dropping in the night previous, and whom I had not as yet had a good look at. They were nearly all whalemen; chief mates, and second mates, and third mates, and sea carpenters, and sea coopers, and sea blacksmiths, and harpooneers, and ship keepers; a brown and brawny company, with bosky beards; an unshorn, shaggy set, all wearing monkey jackets for morning gowns.

You could pretty plainly tell how long each one had been ashore. This young fellow’s healthy cheek is like a sun-toasted pear in hue, and would seem to smell almost as musky; he cannot have been three days landed from his Indian voyage. That man next him looks a few shades lighter; you might say a touch of satin wood is in him. In the complexion of a third still lingers a tropic tawn, but slightly bleached withal; he doubtless has tarried whole weeks ashore. But who could show a cheek like Queequeg? which, barred with various tints, seemed like the Andes’ western slope, to show forth in one array, contrasting climates, zone by zone.

“Grub, ho!” now cried the landlord, flinging open a door, and in we went to breakfast.

They say that men who have seen the world, thereby become quite at ease in manner, quite self-possessed in company. Not always, though: Ledyard, the great New England traveller, and Mungo Park, the Scotch one; of all men, they possessed the least assurance in the parlor. But perhaps the mere crossing of Siberia in a sledge drawn by dogs as Ledyard did, or the taking a long solitary walk on an empty stomach, in the negro heart of Africa, which was the sum of poor Mungo’s performances– this kind of travel, I say, may not be the very best mode of attaining a high social polish. Still, for the most part, that sort of thing is to be had anywhere.

These reflections just here are occasioned by the circumstance that after we were all seated at the table, and I was preparing to hear some good stories about whaling; to my no small surprise nearly every man maintained a profound silence. And not only that, but they looked embarrassed. Yes, here were a set of sea-dogs, many of whom without the slightest bashfulness had boarded great whales on the high seas–entire strangers to them– and duelled them dead without winking; and yet, here they sat at a social breakfast table–all of the same calling, all of kindred tastes–looking round as sheepishly at each other as though they had never been out of sight of some sheepfold among the Green Mountains. A curious sight; these bashful bears, these timid warrior whalemen!

But as for Queequeg–why, Queequeg sat there among them– at the head of the table, too, it so chanced; as cool as an icicle. To be sure I cannot say much for his breeding. His greatest admirer could not have cordially justified his bringing his harpoon into breakfast with him, and using it there without ceremony; reaching over the table with it, to the imminent jeopardy of many heads, and grappling the beefsteaks towards him. But that was certainly very coolly done by him, and every one knows that in most people’s estimation, to do anything coolly is to do it genteelly.

We will not speak of all Queequeg’s peculiarities here; how he eschewed coffee and hot rolls, and applied his undivided attention to beefsteaks, done rare. Enough, that when breakfast was over he withdrew like the rest into the public room, lighted his tomahawk-pipe, and was sitting there quietly digesting and smoking with his inseparable hat on, when I sallied out for a stroll.

CHAPTER 6

The Street

If I had been astonished at first catching a glimpse of so outlandish an individual as Queequeg circulating among the polite society of a civilized town, that astonishment soon departed upon taking my first daylight stroll through the streets of New Bedford.

In thoroughfares nigh the docks, any considerable seaport will frequently offer to view the queerest looking nondescripts from foreign parts. Even in Broadway and Chestnut streets, Mediterranean mariners will sometimes jostle the affrighted ladies. Regent Street is not unknown to Lascars and Malays; and at Bombay, in the Apollo Green, live Yankees have often scared the natives. But New Bedford beats all Water Street and Wapping. In these last-mentioned haunts you see only sailors; but in New Bedford, actual cannibals stand chatting at street corners; savages outright; many of whom yet carry on their bones unholy flesh. It makes a stranger stare.

But, besides the Feegeeans, Tongatobooarrs, Erromanggoans, Pannangians, and Brighggians, and, besides the wild specimens of the whaling-craft which unheeded reel about the streets, you will see other sights still more curious, certainly more comical. There weekly arrive in this town scores of green Vermonters and New Hampshire men, all athirst for gain and glory in the fishery. They are mostly young, of stalwart frames; fellows who have felled forests, and now seek to drop the axe and snatch the whale-lance. Many are as green as the Green Mountains whence they came. In some things you would think them but a few hours old. Look there! that chap strutting round the corner. He wears a beaver hat and swallow-tailed coat, girdled with a sailor-belt and a sheath-knife. Here comes another with a sou’-wester and a bombazine cloak.

No town-bred dandy will compare with a country-bred one–I mean a downright bumpkin dandy–a fellow that, in the dog-days, will mow his two acres in buckskin gloves for fear of tanning his hands. Now when a country dandy like this takes it into his head to make a distinguished reputation, and joins the great whale-fishery, you should see the comical things he does upon reaching the seaport. In bespeaking his sea-outfit, he orders bell-buttons to his waistcoats; straps to his canvas trowsers. Ah, poor Hay-Seed! how bitterly will burst those straps in the first howling gale, when thou art driven, straps, buttons, and all, down the throat of the tempest.

But think not that this famous town has only harpooneers, cannibals, and bumpkins to show her visitors. Not at all. Still New Bedford is a queer place. Had it not been for us whalemen, that tract of land would this day perhaps have been in as howling condition as the coast of Labrador. As it is, parts of her back country are enough to frighten one, they look so bony. The town itself is perhaps the dearest place to live in, in all New England. It is a land of oil, true enough: but not like Canaan; a land, also, of corn and wine. The streets do not run with milk; nor in the spring-time do they pave them with fresh eggs. Yet, in spite of this, nowhere in all America will you find more patrician-like houses; parks and gardens more opulent, than in New Bedford. Whence came they? how planted upon this once scraggy scoria of a country?

Go and gaze upon the iron emblematical harpoons round yonder lofty mansion, and your question will be answered. Yes; all these brave houses and flowery gardens came from the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. One and all, they were harpooned and dragged up hither from the bottom of the sea. Can Herr Alexander perform a feat like that?

In New Bedford, fathers, they say, give whales for dowers to their daughters, and portion off their nieces with a few porpoises a-piece. You must go to New Bedford to see a brilliant wedding; for, they say, they have reservoirs of oil in every house, and every night recklessly burn their lengths in spermaceti candles.

In summer time, the town is sweet to see; full of fine maples– long avenues of green and gold. And in August, high in air, the beautiful and bountiful horse-chestnuts, candelabra-wise, proffer the passer-by their tapering upright cones of congregated blossoms. So omnipotent is art; which in many a district of New Bedford has superinduced bright terraces of flowers upon the barren refuse rocks thrown aside at creation’s final day.

And the women of New Bedford, they bloom like their own red roses. But roses only bloom in summer; whereas the fine carnation of their cheeks is perennial as sunlight in the seventh heavens. Elsewhere match that bloom of theirs, ye cannot, save in Salem, where they tell me the young girls breathe such musk, their sailor sweethearts smell them miles off shore, as though they were drawing nigh the odorous Moluccas instead of the Puritanic sands.

CHAPTER 7

The Chapel

In this same New Bedford there stands a Whaleman’s Chapel, and few are the moody fishermen, shortly bound for the Indian Ocean or Pacific, who fail to make a Sunday visit to the spot. I am sure that I did not.

Returning from my first morning stroll, I again sallied out upon this special errand. The sky had changed from clear, sunny cold, to driving sleet and mist. Wrapping myself in my shaggy jacket of the cloth called bearskin, I fought my way against the stubborn storm. Entering, I found a small scattered congregation of sailors, and sailors’ wives and widows. A muffled silence reigned, only broken at times by the shrieks of the storm. Each silent worshipper seemed purposely sitting apart from the other, as if each silent grief were insular and incommunicable. The chaplain had not yet arrived; and there these silent islands of men and women sat steadfastly eyeing several marble tablets, with black borders, masoned into the wall on either side the pulpit. Three of them ran something like the following, but I do not pretend to quote:

SACRED

TO THE MEMORY

OF

JOHN TALBOT,

Who, at the age of eighteen, was lost overboard Near the Isle of Desolation, off Patagonia, November 1st, 1836.

THIS TABLET

Is erected to his Memory

BY HIS SISTER.

SACRED

TO THE MEMORY

OF

ROBERT LONG, WILLIS ELLERY, NATHAN COLEMAN, WALTER CANNY, SETH MACY, AND SAMUEL GLEIG,

Forming one of the boats’ crews OF

THE SHIP ELIZA

Who were towed out of sight by a Whale, On the Off-shore Ground in the

PACIFIC,

December 31st, 1839.

THIS MARBLE

Is here placed by their surviving SHIPMATES.

SACRED

TO THE MEMORY

OF

The late

CAPTAIN EZEKIEL HARDY,

Who in the bows of his boat was killed by a Sperm Whale on the coast of Japan, August 3d, 1833.

THIS TABLET

Is erected to his Memory

BY

HIS WIDOW.

Shaking off the sleet from my ice-glazed hat and jacket, I seated myself near the door, and turning sideways was surprised to see Queequeg near me. Affected by the solemnity of the scene, there was a wondering gaze of incredulous curiosity in his countenance. This savage was the only person present who seemed to notice my entrance; because he was the only one who could not read, and, therefore, was not reading those frigid inscriptions on the wall. Whether any of the relatives of the seamen whose names appeared there were now among the congregation, I knew not; but so many are the unrecorded accidents in the fishery, and so plainly did several women present wear the countenance if not the trappings of some unceasing grief, that I feel sure that here before me were assembled those, in whose unhealing hearts the sight of those bleak tablets sympathetically caused the old wounds to bleed afresh.

Oh! ye whose dead lie buried beneath the green grass; who standing among flowers can say–here, here lies my beloved; ye know not the desolation that broods in bosoms like these. What bitter blanks in those black-bordered marbles which cover no ashes! What despair in those immovable inscriptions! What deadly voids and unbidden infidelities in the lines that seem to gnaw upon all Faith, and refuse resurrections to the beings who have placelessly perished without a grave. As well might those tablets stand in the cave of Elephanta as here.

In what census of living creatures, the dead of mankind are included; why it is that a universal proverb says of them, that they tell no tales, though containing more secrets than the Goodwin Sands! how it is that to his name who yesterday departed for the other world, we prefix so significant and infidel a word, and yet do not thus entitle him, if he but embarks for the remotest Indies of this living earth; why the Life Insurance Companies pay death-forfeitures upon immortals; in what eternal, unstirring paralysis, and deadly, hopeless trance, yet lies antique Adam who died sixty round centuries ago; how it is that we still refuse to be comforted for those who we nevertheless maintain are dwelling in unspeakable bliss; why all the living so strive to hush all the dead; wherefore but the rumor of a knocking in a tomb will terrify a whole city. All these things are not without their meanings.

But Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these dead doubts she gathers her most vital hope.

It needs scarcely to be told, with what feelings, on the eve of a Nantucket voyage, I regarded those marble tablets, and by the murky light of that darkened, doleful day read the fate of the whalemen who had gone before me. Yes, Ishmael, the same fate may be thine. But somehow I grew merry again. Delightful inducements to embark, fine chance for promotion, it seems–aye, a stove boat will make me an immortal by brevet. Yes, there is death in this business of whaling–a speechlessly quick chaotic bundling of a man into Eternity. But what then? Methinks we have hugely mistaken this matter of Life and Death. Methinks that what they call my shadow here on earth is my true substance. Methinks that in looking at things spiritual, we are too much like oysters observing the sun through the water, and thinking that thick water the thinnest of air. Methinks my body is but the lees of my better being. In fact take my body who will, take it I say, it is not me. And therefore three cheers for Nantucket; and come a stove boat and stove body when they will, for stave my soul, Jove himself cannot.

CHAPTER 8

The Pulpit

I had not been seated very long ere a man of a certain venerable robustness entered; immediately as the storm-pelted door flew back upon admitting him, a quick regardful eyeing of him by all the congregation, sufficiently attested that this fine old man was the chaplain. Yes, it was the famous Father Mapple, so called by the whalemen, among whom he was a very great favorite. He had been a sailor and a harpooneer in his youth, but for many years past had dedicated his life to the ministry. At the time I now write of, Father Mapple was in the hardy winter of a healthy old age; that sort of old age which seems merging into a second flowering youth, for among all the fissures of his wrinkles, there shone certain mild gleams of a newly developing bloom– the spring verdure peeping forth even beneath February’s snow. No one having previously heard his history, could for the first time behold Father Mapple without the utmost interest, because there were certain engrafted clerical peculiarities about him, imputable to that adventurous maritime life he had led. When he entered I observed that he carried no umbrella, and certainly had not come in his carriage, for his tarpaulin hat ran down with melting sleet, and his great pilot cloth jacket seemed almost to drag him to the floor with the weight of the water it had absorbed. However, hat and coat and overshoes were one by one removed, and hung up in a little space in an adjacent corner; when, arrayed in a decent suit, he quietly approached the pulpit.

Like most old fashioned pulpits, it was a very lofty one, and since a regular stairs to such a height would, by its long angle with the floor, seriously contract the already small area of the chapel, the architect, it seemed, had acted upon the hint of Father Mapple, and finished the pulpit without a stairs, substituting a perpendicular side ladder, like those used in mounting a ship from a boat at sea. The wife of a whaling captain had provided the chapel with a handsome pair of red worsted man-ropes for this ladder, which, being itself nicely headed, and stained with a mahogany color, the whole contrivance, considering what manner of chapel it was, seemed by no means in bad taste. Halting for an instant at the foot of the ladder, and with both hands grasping the ornamental knobs of the man-ropes, Father Mapple cast a look upwards, and then with a truly sailor-like but still reverential dexterity, hand over hand, mounted the steps as if ascending the main-top of his vessel.

The perpendicular parts of this side ladder, as is usually the case with swinging ones, were of cloth-covered rope, only the rounds were of wood, so that at every step there was a joint. At my first glimpse of the pulpit, it had not escaped me that however convenient for a ship, these joints in the present instance seemed unnecessary. For I was not prepared to see Father Mapple after gaining the height, slowly turn round, and stooping over the pulpit, deliberately drag up the ladder step by step, till the whole was deposited within, leaving him impregnable in his little Quebec.

I pondered some time without fully comprehending the reason for this. Father Mapple enjoyed such a wide reputation for sincerity and sanctity, that I could not suspect him of courting notoriety by any mere tricks of the stage. No, thought I, there must be some sober reason for this thing; furthermore, it must symbolize something unseen. Can it be, then, that by that act of physical isolation, he signifies his spiritual withdrawal for the time, from all outward worldly ties and connexions? Yes, for replenished with the meat and wine of the word, to the faithful man of God, this pulpit, I see, is a self-containing stronghold–a lofty Ehrenbreitstein, with a perennial well of water within the walls.

But the side ladder was not the only strange feature of the place, borrowed from the chaplain’s former sea-farings. Between the marble cenotaphs on either hand of the pulpit, the wall which formed its back was adorned with a large painting representing a gallant ship beating against a terrible storm off a lee coast of black rocks and snowy breakers. But high above the flying scud and dark-rolling clouds, there floated a little isle of sunlight, from which beamed forth an angel’s face; and this bright face shed a distant spot of radiance upon the ship’s tossed deck, something like that silver plate now inserted into the Victory’s plank where Nelson fell. “Ah, noble ship,” the angel seemed to say, “beat on, beat on, thou noble ship, and bear a hardy helm; for lo! the sun is breaking through; the clouds are rolling off– serenest azure is at hand.”

Nor was the pulpit itself without a trace of the same sea-taste that had achieved the ladder and the picture. Its panelled front was in the likeness of a ship’s bluff bows, and the Holy Bible rested on a projecting piece of scroll work, fashioned after a ship’s fiddle-headed beak.

What could be more full of meaning?–for the pulpit is ever this earth’s foremost part; all the rest comes in its rear; the pulpit leads the world. From thence it is the storm of God’s quick wrath is first descried, and the bow must bear the earliest brunt. From thence it is the God of breezes fair or foul is first invoked for favorable winds. Yes, the world’s a ship on its passage out, and not a voyage complete; and the pulpit is its prow.

CHAPTER 9

The Sermon

Father Mapple rose, and in a mild voice of unassuming authority ordered the scattered people to condense. “Star board gangway, there! side away to larboard–larboard gangway to starboard! Midships! midships!”

There was a low rumbling of heavy sea-boots among the benches, and a still slighter shuffling of women’s shoes, and all was quiet again, and every eye on the preacher.

He paused a little; then kneeling in the pulpit’s bows, folded his large brown hands across his chest, uplifted his closed eyes, and offered a prayer so deeply devout that he seemed kneeling and praying at the bottom of the sea.

This ended, in prolonged solemn tones, like the continual tolling of a bell in a ship that is foundering at sea in a fog– in such tones he commenced reading the following hymn; but changing his manner towards the concluding stanzas, burst forth with a pealing exultation and joy–

The ribs and terrors in the whale, Arched over me a dismal gloom,

While all God’s sun-lit waves rolled by, And lift me deepening down to doom.

I saw the opening maw of hell,

With endless pains and sorrows there; Which none but they that feel can tell– Oh, I was plunging to despair.

In black distress, I called my God, When I could scarce believe him mine, He bowed his ear to my complaints– No more the whale did me confine.

With speed he flew to my relief, As on a radiant dolphin borne;

Awful, yet bright, as lightning shone The face of my Deliverer God.

My song for ever shall record

That terrible, that joyful hour; I give the glory to my God,

His all the mercy and the power.

Nearly all joined in singing this hymn, which swelled high above the howling of the storm. A brief pause ensued; the preacher slowly turned over the leaves of the Bible, and at last, folding his hand down upon the proper page, said: “Beloved shipmates, clinch the last verse of the first chapter of Jonah–‘And God had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah.'”

“Shipmates, this book, containing only four chapters– four yarns–is one of the smallest strands in the mighty cable of the Scriptures. Yet what depths of the soul does Jonah’s deep sealine sound! what a pregnant lesson to us is this prophet! What a noble thing is that canticle in the fish’s belly! How billow-like and boisterously grand! We feel the floods surging over us, we sound with him to the kelpy bottom of the waters; sea-weed and all the slime of the sea is about us! But what is this lesson that the book of Jonah teaches? Shipmates, it is a two-stranded lesson; a lesson to us all as sinful men, and a lesson to me as a pilot of the living God. As sinful men, it is a lesson to us all, because it is a story of the sin, hard-heartedness, suddenly awakened fears, the swift punishment, repentance, prayers, and finally the deliverance and joy of Jonah. As with all sinners among men, the sin of this son of Amittai was in his wilful disobedience of the command of God– never mind now what that command was, or how conveyed– which he found a hard command. But all the things that God would have us do are hard for us to do–remember that– and hence, he oftener commands us than endeavors to persuade. And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in this disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists.

“With this sin of disobedience in him, Jonah still further flouts at God, by seeking to flee from Him. He thinks that a ship made by men, will carry him into countries where God does not reign but only the Captains of this earth. He skulks about the wharves of Joppa, and seeks a ship that’s bound for Tarshish. There lurks, perhaps, a hitherto unheeded meaning here. By all accounts Tarshish could have been no other city than the modern Cadiz. That’s the opinion of learned men. And where is Cadiz, shipmates? Cadiz is in Spain; as far by water, from Joppa, as Jonah could possibly have sailed in those ancient days, when the Atlantic was an almost unknown sea. Because Joppa, the modern Jaffa, shipmates, is on the most easterly coast of the Mediterranean, the Syrian; and Tarshish or Cadiz more than two thousand miles to the westward from that, just outside the Straits of Gibraltar. See ye not then, shipmates, that Jonah sought to flee worldwide from God? Miserable man! Oh! most contemptible and worthy of all scorn; with slouched hat and guilty eye, skulking from his God; prowling among the shipping like a vile burglar hastening to cross the seas. So disordered, self-condemning is his look, that had there been policemen in those days, Jonah, on the mere suspicion of something wrong, had been arrested ere he touched a deck. How plainly he’s a fugitive! no baggage, not a hat-box, valise, or carpet-bag,–no friends accompany him to the wharf with their adieux. At last, after much dodging search, he finds the Tarshish ship receiving the last items of her cargo; and as he steps on board to see its Captain in the cabin, all the sailors for the moment desist from hoisting in the goods, to mark the stranger’s evil eye. Jonah sees this; but in vain he tries to look all ease and confidence; in vain essays his wretched smile. Strong intuitions of the man assure the mariners he can be no innocent. In their gamesome but still serious way, one whispers to the other–“Jack, he’s robbed a widow;” or, “Joe, do you mark him; he’s a bigamist;” or, “Harry lad, I guess he’s the adulterer that broke jail in old Gomorrah, or belike, one of the missing murderers from Sodom.” Another runs to read the bill that’s stuck against the spile upon the wharf to which the ship is moored, offering five hundred gold coins for the apprehension of a parricide, and containing a description of his person. He reads, and looks from Jonah to the bill; while all his sympathetic shipmates now crowd round Jonah, prepared to lay their hands upon him. Frighted Jonah trembles. and summoning all his boldness to his face, only looks so much the more a coward. He will not confess himself suspected; but that itself is strong suspicion. So he makes the best of it; and when the sailors find him not to be the man that is advertised, they let him pass, and he descends into the cabin.

“‘Who’s there?’ cries the Captain at his busy desk, hurriedly making out his papers for the Customs–‘Who’s there?’ Oh! how that harmless question mangles Jonah! For the instant he almost turns to flee again. But he rallies. ‘I seek a passage in this ship to Tarshish; how soon sail ye, sir?’ Thus far the busy Captain had not looked up to Jonah, though the man now stands before him; but no sooner does he hear that hollow voice, than he darts a scrutinizing glance. ‘We sail with the next coming tide,’ at last he slowly answered, still intently eyeing him. ‘No sooner, sir?’–‘Soon enough for any honest man that goes a passenger.’ Ha! Jonah, that’s another stab. But he swiftly calls away the Captain from that scent. ‘I’ll sail with ye,’–he says,–‘the passage money how much is that?– I’ll pay now.’ For it is particularly written, shipmates, as if it were a thing not to be overlooked in this history, ‘that he paid the fare thereof’ ere the craft did sail. And taken with the context, this is full of meaning.

“Now Jonah’s Captain, shipmates, was one whose discernment detects crime in any, but whose cupidity exposes it only in the penniless. In this world, shipmates, sin that pays its way can travel freely and without a passport; whereas Virtue, if a pauper, is stopped at all frontiers. So Jonah’s Captain prepares to test the length of Jonah’s purse, ere he judge him openly. He charges him thrice the usual sum; and it’s assented to. Then the Captain knows that Jonah is a fugitive; but at the same time resolves to help a flight that paves its rear with gold. Yet when Jonah fairly takes out his purse, prudent suspicions still molest the Captain. He rings every coin to find a counterfeit. Not a forger, any way, he mutters; and Jonah is put down for his passage. ‘Point out my state-room, Sir,’ says Jonah now, ‘I’m travel-weary; I need sleep.” “Thou look’st like it,’ says the Captain, ‘there’s thy room.’ Jonah enters, and would lock the door, but the lock contains no key. Hearing him foolishly fumbling there, the Captain laughs lowly to himself, and mutters something about the doors of convicts’ cells being never allowed to be locked within. All dressed and dusty as he is, Jonah throws himself into his berth, and finds the little state-room ceiling almost resting on his forehead. The air is close, and Jonah gasps. Then, in that contracted hole, sunk, too, beneath the ship’s water-line, Jonah feels the heralding presentiment of that stifling hour, when the whale shall hold him in the smallest of his bowels’ wards.

“Screwed at its axis against the side, a swinging lamp slightly oscillates in Jonah’s room; and the ship, heeling over towards the wharf with the weight of the last bales received, the lamp, flame and all, though in slight motion, still maintains a permanent obliquity with reference to the room; though, in truth, infallibly straight itself, it but made obvious the false, lying levels among which it hung. The lamp alarms and frightens Jonah; as lying in his berth his tormented eyes roll round the place, and this thus far successful fugitive finds no refuge for his restless glance. But that contradiction in the lamp more and more appals him. The floor, the ceiling, and the side, are all awry. ‘Oh! so my conscience hangs in me!’ he groans, “straight upward, so it burns; but the chambers of my soul are all in crookedness!’

“Like one who after a night of drunken revelry hies to his bed, still reeling, but with conscience yet pricking him, as the plungings of the Roman race-horse but so much the more strike his steel tags into him; as one who in that miserable plight still turns and turns in giddy anguish, praying God for annihilation until the fit be passed; and at last amid the whirl of woe he feels, a deep stupor steals over him, as over the man who bleeds to death, for conscience is the wound, and there’s naught to staunch it; so, after sore wrestling in his berth, Jonah’s prodigy of ponderous misery drags him drowning down to sleep.

“And now the time of tide has come; the ship casts off her cables; and from the deserted wharf the uncheered ship for Tarshish, all careening, glides to sea. That ship, my friends, was the first of recorded smugglers! the contraband was Jonah. But the sea rebels; he will not bear the wicked burden. A dreadful storm comes on, the ship is like to break. But now when the boatswain calls all hands to lighten her; when boxes, bales, and jars are clattering overboard; when the wind is shrieking, and the men are yelling, and every plank thunders with trampling feet right over Jonah’s head; in all this raging tumult, Jonah sleeps his hideous sleep. He sees no black sky and raging sea, feels not the reeling timbers, and little hears he or heeds he the far rush of the mighty whale, which even now with open mouth is cleaving the seas after him. Aye, shipmates, Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship– a berth in the cabin as I have taken it, and was fast asleep. But the frightened master comes to him, and shrieks in his dead ear, ‘What meanest thou, O, sleeper! arise!’ Startled from his lethargy by that direful cry, Jonah staggers to his feet, and stumbling to the deck, grasps a shroud, to look out upon the sea. But at that moment he is sprung upon by a panther billow leaping over the bulwarks. Wave after wave thus leaps into the ship, and finding no speedy vent runs roaring fore and aft, till the mariners come nigh to drowning while yet afloat. And ever, as the white moon shows her affrighted face from the steep gullies in the blackness overhead, aghast Jonah sees the rearing bowsprit pointing high upward, but soon beat downward again towards the tormented deep.

“Terrors upon terrors run shouting through his soul. In all his cringing attitudes, the God-fugitive is now too plainly known. The sailors mark him; more and more certain grow their suspicions of him, and at last, fully to test the truth, by referring the whole matter to high Heaven, they all-outward to casting lots, to see for whose cause this great tempest was upon them. The lot is Jonah’s; that discovered, then how furiously they mob him with their questions. ‘What is thine occupation? Whence comest thou? Thy country? What people? But mark now, my shipmates, the behavior of poor Jonah. The eager mariners but ask him who he is, and where from; whereas, they not only receive an answer to those questions, but likewise another answer to a question not put by them, but the unsolicited answer is forced from Jonah by the hard hand of God that is upon him.

“‘I am a Hebrew,’ he cries–and then–‘I fear the Lord the God of Heaven who hath made the sea and the dry land!’ Fear him, O Jonah? Aye, well mightest thou fear the Lord God then! Straightway, he now goes on to make a full confession; whereupon the mariners became more and more appalled, but still are pitiful. For when Jonah, not yet supplicating God for mercy, since he but too well knew the darkness of his deserts,– when wretched Jonah cries out to them to take him and cast him forth into the sea, for he knew that for his sake this great tempest was upon them; they mercifully turn from him, and seek by other means to save the ship. But all in vain; the indignant gale howls louder; then, with one hand raised invokingly to God, with the other they not unreluctantly lay hold of Jonah.

“And now behold Jonah taken up as an anchor and dropped into the sea; when instantly an oily calmness floats out from the east, and the sea is still, as Jonah carries down the gale with him, leaving smooth water behind. He goes down in the whirling heart of such a masterless commotion that he scarce heeds the moment when he drops seething into the yawning jaws awaiting him; and the whale shoots-to all his ivory teeth, like so many white bolts, upon his prison. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord out of the fish’s belly. But observe his prayer, and so many white bolts, upon his prison. Then Jonah prayed unto learn a weighty lesson. For sinful as he is, Jonah does not weep and wail for direct deliverance. He feels that his dreadful punishment is just. He leaves all his deliverance to God, contenting himself with this, that spite of all his pains and pangs, he will still look towards His holy temple. And here, shipmates, is true and faithful repentance; not clamorous for pardon, but grateful for punishment. And how pleasing to God was this conduct in Jonah, is shown in the eventual deliverance of him from the sea and the whale. Shipmates, I do not place Jonah before you to be copied for his sin but I do place him before you as a model for repentance. Sin not; but if you do, take heed to repent of it like Jonah.”

While he was speaking these words, the howling of the shrieking, slanting storm without seemed to add new power to the preacher, who, when describing Jonah’s sea-storm, seemed tossed by a storm himself. His deep chest heaved as with a ground-swell; his tossed arms seemed the warring elements at work; and the thunders that rolled away from off his swarthy brow, and the light leaping from his eye, made all his simple hearers look on him with a quick fear that was strange to them.

There now came a lull in his look, as he silently turned over the leaves of the Book once more; and, at last, standing motionless, with closed eyes, for the moment, seemed communing with God and himself.

But again he leaned over towards the people, and bowing his head lowly, with an aspect of the deepest yet manliest humility, he spake these words:

“Shipmates, God has laid but one hand upon you; both his hands press upon me. I have read ye by what murky light may be mine the lesson that Jonah teaches to all sinners; and therefore to ye, and still more to me, for I am a greater sinner than ye. And now how gladly would I come down from this mast-head and sit on the hatches there where you sit, and listen as you listen, while some one of you reads me that other and more awful lesson which Jonah teaches to me, as a pilot of the living God. How being an anointed pilot-prophet, or speaker of true things and bidden by the Lord to sound those unwelcome truths in the ears of a wicked Nineveh, Jonah, appalled at the hostility he should raise, fled from his mission, and sought to escape his duty and his God by taking ship at Joppa. But God is everywhere; Tarshish he never reached. As we have seen, God came upon him in the whale, and swallowed him down to living gulfs of doom, and with swift slantings tore him along ‘into the midst of the seas,’ where the eddying depths sucked him ten thousand fathoms down, and ‘the weeds were wrapped about his head,’ and all the watery world of woe bowled over him. Yet even then beyond the reach of any plummet–‘out of the belly of hell’–when the whale grounded upon the ocean’s utmost bones, even then, God heard the engulphed, repenting prophet when he cried. Then God spake unto the fish; and from the shuddering cold and blackness of the sea, the whale came breeching up towards the warm and pleasant sun, and all the delights of air and earth; and ‘vomited out Jonah upon the dry land;’ when the word of the Lord came a second time; and Jonah, bruised and beaten–his ears, like two sea-shells, still multitudinously murmuring of the ocean– Jonah did the Almighty’s bidding. And what was that, shipmates? To preach the Truth to the face of Falsehood! That was it!

“This, shipmates, this is that other lesson; and woe to that pilot of the living God who slights it. Woe to him whom this world charms from Gospel duty! Woe to him who seeks to pour oil upon the waters when God has brewed them into a gale! Woe to him who seeks to please rather than to appal! Woe to him whose good name is more to him than goodness! Woe to him who, in this world, courts not dishonor! Woe to him who would not be true, even though to be false were salvation! Yea, woe to him who as the great Pilot Paul has it, while preaching to others is himself a castaway!

He drooped and fell away from himself for a moment; then lifting his face to them again, showed a deep joy in his eyes, as he cried out with a heavenly enthusiasm,–“But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the main-truck higher than the kelson is low? Delight is to him–a far, far upward, and inward delight– who against the proud gods and commodores of this earth, ever stands forth his own inexorable self. Delight is to him whose strong arms yet support him, when the ship of this base treacherous world has gone down beneath him. Delight is to him, who gives no quarter in the truth, and kills, burns, and destroys all sin though he pluck it out from under the robes of Senators and Judges. Delight,–top-gallant delight is to him, who acknowledges no law or lord, but the Lord his God, and is only a patriot to heaven. Delight is to him, whom all the waves of the billows of the seas of the boisterous mob can never shake from this sure Keel of the Ages. And eternal delight and deliciousness will be his, who coming to lay him down, can say with his final breath–O Father!– chiefly known to me by Thy rod–mortal or immortal, here I die. I have striven to be Thine, more than to be this world’s, or mine own. Yet this is nothing: I leave eternity to Thee; for what is man that he should live out the lifetime of his God?”

He said no more, but slowly waving a benediction, covered his face with his hands, and so remained kneeling, till all the people had departed, and he was left alone in the place.

CHAPTER 10

A Bosom Friend

Returning to the Spouter-Inn from the Chapel, I found Queequeg there quite alone; he having left the Chapel before the benediction some time. He was sitting on a bench before the fire, with his feet on the stove hearth, and in one hand was holding close up to his face that little negro idol of his; peering hard into its face, and with a jack-knife gently whittling away at its nose, meanwhile humming to himself in his heathenish way.

But being now interrupted, he put up the image; and pretty soon, going to the table, took up a large book there, and placing it on his lap began counting the pages with deliberate regularity; at every fiftieth page– as I fancied–stopping for a moment, looking vacantly around him, and giving utterance to a long-drawn gurgling whistle of astonishment. He would then begin again at the next fifty; seeming to commence at number one each time, as though he could not count more than fifty, and it was only by such a large number of fifties being found together, that his astonishment at the multitude of pages was excited.

With much interest I sat watching him. Savage though he was, and hideously marred about the face–at least to my taste– his countenance yet had a something in it which was by no means disagreeable. You cannot hide the soul. Through all his unearthly tattooings, I thought I saw the traces of a simple honest heart; and in his large, deep eyes, fiery black and bold, there seemed tokens of a spirit that would dare a thousand devils. And besides all this, there was a certain lofty bearing about the Pagan, which even his uncouthness could not altogether maim. He looked like a man who had never cringed and never had had a creditor. Whether it was, too, that his head being shaved, his forehead was drawn out in freer and brighter relief, and looked more expansive than it otherwise would, this I will not venture to decide; but certain it was his head was phrenologically an excellent one. It may seem ridiculous, but it reminded me of General Washington’s head, as seen in the popular busts of him. It had the same long regularly graded retreating slope from above the brows, which were likewise very projecting, like two long promontories thickly wooded on top. Queequeg was George Washington cannibalistically developed.

Whilst I was thus closely scanning him, half-pretending meanwhile to be looking out at the storm from the casement, he never heeded my presence, never troubled himself with so much as a single glance; but appeared wholly occupied with counting the pages of the marvellous book. Considering how sociably we had been sleeping together the night previous, and especially considering the affectionate arm I had found thrown over me upon waking in the morning, I thought this indifference of his very strange. But savages are strange beings; at times you do not know exactly how to take them. At first they are overawing; their calm self-collectedness of simplicity seems as Socratic wisdom. I had noticed also that Queequeg never consorted at all, or but very little, with the other seamen in the inn. He made no advances whatever; appeared to have no desire to enlarge the circle of his acquaintances. All this struck me as mighty singular; yet, upon second thoughts, there was something almost sublime in it. Here was a man some twenty thousand miles from home, by the way of Cape Horn, that is– which was the only way he could get there–thrown among people as strange to him as though he were in the planet Jupiter; and yet he seemed entirely at his ease; preserving the utmost serenity; content with his own companionship; always equal to himself. Surely this was a touch of fine philosophy; though no doubt he had never heard there was such a thing as that. But, perhaps, to be true philosophers, we mortals should not be conscious of so living or so striving. So soon as I hear that such or such a man gives himself out for a philosopher, I conclude that, like the dyspeptic old woman,

-🍒🚬

....

mods jfk his ass

[rixareth]

Okay so I know it's been well over a decade since you've written anything Top Gear related but I was showing my roommate an episode the other day and telling him stuff about my Top Gear fandom days so now I am curious if you've got any bits and pieces leftover from back when, so for the fanfiction meme, Top Gear? (And if you don't, completely understandable)

(unfinished fanfiction ask meme)

Oh, wow, we're really getting into the deep lore here. Here's something... mildly weird and dark? By Top Gear standards, at least. Because apparently I decided I should write two crossovers between Top Gear and Silent Hill. But Silent Hill is in Wales, for some reason.

(I know the reason. It's because this was also going to be a crossover with Torchwood. It's probably for the best that it never got finished.)

A light mist was resting on the hills around them.

James was driving, and the other two had just woken up from their shared slumber, which was fortunate because it meant that they could correct his course but unfortunate because they were clearly now never going to stop mocking him about it.

“Snowdon, James,” Jeremy said, rolling his eyes. “North Wales. Meaning that we should have been travelling north. Did you not notice at any point that the sun was on your right?”

“I’ll have you know that I paid particular attention to the position of the sun,” James retorted, irritated; after all, they could have gone much less out of their way had Jeremy or Richard had the common courtesy to stay awake. “It’s just that my last journey to North Wales was in the morning, and, well, I hadn’t really considered the fact that it would be in the west on this occasion.”

Jeremy burst out laughing. James tightened his grip on the steering wheel and stared resolutely ahead.

“Well,” Jeremy said, when he had recovered himself, “as we’re obviously not going to make Snowdonia before nightfall, on account of James being the worst driver in the world, we may as well change the challenge location. There aren’t any good mountains in Cardiff, are there, Hammond?”

When Richard didn’t cheerfully join in with the mockery, Jeremy frowned and twisted around in his seat. “Hammond?”

Richard was sitting in the back, staring intently out into the gathering darkness and fog. At the sound of Jeremy’s voice, he seemed to come out of a reverie and looked up at him, plainly uneasy. “I just – ” He hesitated; glanced out of the window again. “I thought I saw something moving out there.”

Under normal circumstances, Jeremy would have mocked him for such an unmanly display of nerves, but something about Richard’s tone or the atmosphere in the car made him hesitate. Instead, he frowned, looking back to the windscreen. “It is getting dark pretty quickly, isn’t it? James, what time is it?”

“I don’t know why you can’t check the time yourself; you’re not the one driving,” James muttered, flicking on the headlamps and glancing at the display. “It’s six o’clock.”

“It’s six o’clock in early August,” Jeremy said in disbelief. “I knew Wales was a miserable country, but this is ridiculous.”

“Can we go back?” Richard asked. There was an odd tightness to his voice. “There must’ve – James, you must’ve passed a hotel or something somewhere.”

“Hammond,” Jeremy said, laughing, “I’m not happy about having to stay in Cardiff either, but it’s not – ”

And then a dark shape lurched towards them out of the fog and James jerked the steering wheel so hard that the car skidded off the road and halfway down a grassy embankment before it came to a halt.

For a moment, all three of them were very still and very silent. James was shaking.

“You’ve got reactions, James,” Jeremy said eventually, with a nervous laugh. “Why can’t you ever put a bit of that speed into our challenges?”

“Don’t joke,” James said, still gripping the steering wheel as if it were the only thing anchoring him in place. His face was very white. “I almost hit someone.”

[helix-enterprises117]

Halo Reloaded: Underdog

John slumped against the cool metal wall of the Spartan barracks, arms crossed as he watched his teammates gearing up with a casual efficiency he could only envy. Kelly was double-checking her equipment with the meticulous care of a brain surgeon, and Fred was casually discussing battle tactics like he was planning a weekend barbecue. John's own gear sat untouched at his feet—a silent rebuke.

"Earth to John. You're staring again. Either you've got a critique of my packing skills, or your head's back in boot camp hell," Kelly teased, snapping her fingers in front of his visor.

John snapped out of his reverie, chuckling despite himself. "Guess I was just thinking about the old grinder days. You know, how I was more of a tripping hazard than a teammate?"

Kelly smirked and leaned against the wall next to him. "Tripping hazard, huh? I remember someone who once dove on a 'grenade' to save the squad during drills. Turned out to be a dud, but still, big hero moves there, John."

"Yeah, a dud—story of my training days," John quipped, but the smile didn't quite reach his eyes. "Seriously, though. Remember how Mendez and the coaches were ready to boot me out? I was like one step away from being shown the door."

Kelly’s expression softened. "You heard that? We thought we kept it under wraps."John nodded. "Heard all of it. Made for a great pep talk, really boosted the old morale."

Fred, overhearing, came over with a grin that could light up a room. "If they had booted you, who would have been my wingman? You think Kelly here can handle my bad jokes?"

"Nobody can handle your bad jokes, Fred," Kelly retorted without missing a beat.John's laugh was genuine this time. "Maybe that’s my secret power, huh? High tolerance for crappy humor?"

"It's a vital skill," Fred agreed, winking. "Seriously, though, John. We all knew you had it rough, but look at you now. Still standing, still fighting. That’s more than just tolerance; that’s guts."

John's gaze drifted to his untouched gear. "I dunno. I always felt like I was two steps behind, trying to play catch-up. Even with all the enhancements, all the tech... I was still the kid who couldn't climb the damn rope in gym class."

"But here you are, climbing mountains instead," Kelly said, nudging him gently. "You didn't just catch up, John; you found your own path. That's what being a Spartan is about. Not just following the road laid out for you, but making your own way when the road runs out."

Fred clapped him on the shoulder, his hand heavy in the best way. "She’s right. You've pulled us out of the fire more times than I can count. You think that's because you can run fast or shoot straight? Nah, it's because you've got something a lot of us golden-egg types lack—a refusal to quit when quitting's the only sensible option."

John considered their words, the familiar weight of self-doubt warring with the burgeoning sense of belonging. Maybe he hadn't been the first to scale the hill or the fastest in the sprints, but he'd never left a man behind, never failed to throw himself into the fray.

"Yeah, well, someone’s gotta be the guy who charges in headfirst, right? Might as well be me." His tone was light, but his heart was suddenly lighter too.

"Exactly!" Kelly punched his arm lightly. "Now, quit moping and gear up, hero. We've got a world to save."

As John bent to strap on his gear, the earlier weight of his thoughts felt less like chains and more like armor. He was here because he refused to give up, because he’d turned his every setback into a step forward, however shaky. With a final click of his helmet, he looked up at his friends, his family.

"Let's go show them what the underdog can do," he said, his voice steady and sure.

Kelly grinned. "That's the spirit. After all, every pack needs its wild card."

[willowwind78]

1 Annabel- Chapter 4

˜ Chapter 4 - Frankenstein - Mary Shelley ™

My spirits were elevated by the enchanting appearance of nature;

The past was blotted from my memory, the present was tranquil,

And the future gilded by bright rays of hope and anticipations of joy.

˜ ™

            The rain had stopped by the time Christina opened her eyes again. Her body lay against the base of a tree. She vaguely recalled passing out. She marveled at the brilliance of the stars in the cloudless sky, lost in their wonder and awesomeness. She felt amazing. For the first time in months, there was no pain. She had slept and there were no dreams. The world around her was new and full of possibility. A strange feeling crept up within her, dark and alluring.

            She was overwhelmed by the vividness of color and light surrounding her so much so that she failed to hear the heart beating not ten feet above her, despite how it echoed cleanly in her ears. Christina was engrossed in studying the craters penetrating the moon’s gray surface when a pair of wing-tipped shoes landed with a silent thump next to her. Silently. She quickly realized they had landed with such delicacy normal ears should not have heard a sound but she did. Her heart tightened, the muscle straining against the inside of her chest at his nearness. Her limbs moved without her, twisting and manipulating her body, prostrating herself before him, head down, arms outstretched.

            “You may relax my child, it is not your body that I need right now, but your tongue.”

            Her voice sounded from her body without her. “Anything your ears wish to hear, my Lord.” Panic gripped her in her reverie. What was happening to her? She felt her body right itself and lean back against the tree seemingly without her. It sat cross-legged and looked up to the suited man eagerly. Christina peered through her own eyes to look down at her hands, something was off. Her skin had taken on a greyish-green tone and was hardening slowly but definitely as if it were growing scales in places. She was in her body but it was no longer hers.

            “Christina, my dear, would you please tell me what you were dreaming about?” His voice was just as inspiring as it was hours, days, or… weeks ago. It soothed a small part of her panicking.

            “I dreamt nothing, my Lord, for the first time in months.” She felt shame in not pleasing him. His disappointment was clear in the roll of his eyes that she had answered him incorrectly. Her head bowed. Through a tear in her tights, she could see where her scabbed over shin had turned to scale.

Her Lord appeared to be growing impatient. His head tilted awkwardly to the side. “What was the last dream you had, Christina?”

The Christina inside had a bad feeling about this but could not prevent herself from thinking back to the horrible nightmares, nor could she stop the Christina outside from recounting everything as she remembered it like a possessed narrator. As soon as the white steeple flashed through her memory and her body began to speak Christina was filled with dread. “There’s a small church; white-washed wooden siding with a tall steeple containing an old iron bell.” As her body betrayed her desire for silence, she felt less and less in control of anything.

“Where is the church, Christina?”

“It looks familiar. There are rolling hills and it is fall. The leaves are all different colors and there is a cliff off in the distance. The church is in the valley with a small cemetery next to it...” Her body’s voice sounded like an automaton, unnaturally punctuating every word and speaking in a monotonic drone. The Christina inside tried to stop thinking about the dream but failed. The harder she tried the more she felt the need to obey. “There are many people dressed in black. They are sad.”

“Do you know these people, Christina?”

Christina would have cried if she had still been attached to her body. This dream had been haunting her for months. It had cost her everything. “Yes, I know them.” He had promised her no more pain but this was torture. She was reliving the dream over and over and over again in her own head. “They are my family.” It was then that she realized where she was. “We are at my mother’s church in Walkersville, West Virginia.”

The dream Christina suddenly appeared and everything went dark. Christina became lost in her own dream listening to the distant sound of her own voice echoing outside of her. “I am in the casket carried by my two brothers, two uncles, my father, and my husband.” The details were lost in the monotonic recitation. It included nothing of her screaming and kicking at the inside of the coffin lid. The body of Christina said nothing of her nails scratching away at the satin lining. It spoke not a word of the real Christina’s desperate attempt to escape her wooden prison. “They place the coffin in the ground.” It speaks not of the panic and fear causing the walls of the casket to shrink ever smaller or of the sinking feeling of the casket as it creeps its way lower and lower into the ground with her inside. It does not even try to describe the horrifying sound of dirt hitting the outside of the wooden box slowly drowning out the sound of her sobbing family.

“Thank you for helping me. We are done now, Christina.”

Christina was horrified as her body collapsed at the base of the tree and her eyes closed throwing her into the darkness she felt in that last dream. She tried to scream but her body did not respond. She could feel nothing but heard the sound of his heartbeat diminish as he walked away. NO! The Christina inside screamed in horror as she realized what was happening. She had been dreaming of her death. She had been dreaming of this. She was trapped inside her own body, helpless. Her mind screamed, trying desperately to cry out while birds chirped cheerfully in the air around her. He was right. There was no pain, only fear.

[friendlyfangs]

happy Pride from Silent Hill !!

also this wip from when i was coloring because orange & blue :)

[star1117-archives]

🎧(hello, I'm usually a silent follower/reader but I wanted to say that I hope you're doing well🩷)

MOONLIGHT - KALI UCHIS

j.yh x gn!reader / fluff / no warnings / unedited

sinking further into the seat of yunho’s car, you let out a contented sigh as you turned to him, leaning on the headrest. his eyes were trained on the road, hand gripping the gear stick as he flicked between the road and his rear view mirror, brows furrowed slightly. small strands of hair fell from his slick back, framing his face perfectly as the streetlights made him shine like an angel. he licked his lips every once in a while, a cute habit you’d picked up on quickly in the time you’d known him. not noticing you were staring, you were shocked out of your reverie when yunho turned to you with a chuckle.

“i’m not gonna disappear if you look away, y’know.”

smiling sheepishly, you continued to study yunho as you spoke. well, revise him was probably more accurate, you’d stared at him for hours on end before.

“it’s not my fault i’ve got such a pretty boyfriend.”

“touché.”

pulling onto a highway, yunho moved his hand from the gearstick to your thigh, stroking the skin softly and squeezing it before returning to the task at hand.

“you make it hard to concentrate on the road, y’know.”

you smiled warmly at him while his ears tinted slightly at the confession, tongue poking his cheek. while it was tempting to tease him, you opted for letting it go, instead leaning forward and turning on some music. yunho smiled when his favourite song came on, letting his hand fall again but to catch your hand for a quick squeeze instead. as you came up to a turn off, yunho looked to you as he slowed.

“stargazing at our place?”

“you know it.”

indicating, he pulled off the road and drove up the dirt path to your place, a small secluded hill that seemed untouched by humanity. getting out of the car, you noticed something else that you had missed in your previous inspections of him.

his eyes glimmered beautifully in the moonlight.

SEND ME A 🎧

[sanrielle]

First chapter now available on AO3 and FFN! Scroll down for a teaser...

Art by Nadiu!

Prologue

Year 200 AG

City lights sparkling in the night hid all evidence of the starry sky above, giving it a gray cast for the lone figure that stood on a hill overlooking the scene—a man in black, invisible to anyone who might be nearby.

He glanced over at the domed, golden building on the edge of the city, then at the statue of Avatar Aang. He felt nothing. There was only the mission. His brothers and sisters would be surrounding the city now, as well as the island in the middle of the bay.

Slowly the sky began to change as if the new dawn had come early. Dark gray gave way to burnt orange—a warm glow that made the energy surge inside him. Blood running hot. Euphoria.

They had said it would feel like this, but he found that words and expectations were not even remotely close to the real thing. And that feeling only grew stronger with every passing moment while the sky burned brighter and brighter. Soon a ball of fire appeared on the horizon. Pulling. Beckoning.

Beep beep beep beep

He reached over to the small device on his wrist and pushed a button to end the faintly irritating noise that pulled him out of his reverie. It was time. 

All was silent for a few seconds, then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and focused all of his chi into his light chakra. It required intense concentration and a deep understanding of the world around him. A connection unlike any other.

He could feel his brothers and sisters in a ring around the city in the moments before the almost overwhelming energy erupted from his forehead in a blinding stream. It hurt. It hurt so much and felt so good. Relief and pain; they meant the same to him. Even through closed eyes, he could see the flash.

For exactly two seconds, the world was enveloped in total silence. He opened his eyes to see an expanding cloud of dust and debris and then—

BOOOOOOM

The shockwave reached his overlook unexpectedly and the ground vanished beneath his feet. Tumbling head over heels into oblivion, every sense overloaded. His breath was violently forced from his lungs as he reconnected with stone and earth. Bones crunched and shattered. It took a minute for the pain to register while he blinked in the dust, gasping.

A purple-golden light met his blurred gaze, like a bruise on fire. It was horrific—the shape of fear and hatred and desperation. He closed his eyes to block it out, and then he died.

Fourteen Years Later

Well, today was terrible. I can’t believe my parents are making me do these sessions and write in this stupid journal. So far it hasn’t helped at all. I’ve decided I’m just going to stop telling them about Yin. In a few weeks, I’ll tell them I’ve grown out of ‘that stuff’ and don’t need to do this anymore.

Mom and Dad were both working all day so I was on Lia duty and she was such a pain in the butt!! More than usual because she’s been cutting a new tooth. Spirits, I’m so sick of cleaning her up and cleaning up after her, especially now that she’s earthbending and making a mess of everything! Ugh, I never want any babies!! Ever!!

I yelled at Mom and Dad when they got home because I’m just so fed up with it. I mean, it’s not like I want to starve to death and I know they have to work but…it’s just not fair. I didn’t ask to have a sister. And I made the mistake of complaining that I don’t ever have time to go into the swamp to practice my firebending. Oops…

Needless to say, Mom’s furious and I’ve been banished to my room. Now I’m sitting here with nothing to do but write in this dumb journal. I just want to get out of this town! Two and a half more years (if I can even stand it for that long). But Dad promised to give me some money to get started on my own if I stay until I’m eighteen. So…I guess I’ll wait. I know they don’t want to lose their babysitter but, hey, if I’m gone they won’t have to buy food for me anymore, right? (I eat a lot!!!)

I’ve got a plan, though: I’m going to find the Avatar! I know, I know, it sounds like a dumb plan, but wouldn’t it be cool? If Avatar Korra is still alive and just imprisoned, then all I have to do is find her and then she can help us escape from wherever she is. If she died years ago, then I need to look for the new Avatar. Together we can figure out what’s going on with this bender plague or whatever it is. And then we can lock up all the blue sages and everything will be good again.

I never told anyone this before but I kinda used to wish I was the Avatar. But Gran said once that the new Avatar would be an earthbender, and I’m a firebender like my grandad-who-shall-not-be-named (seriously—I don’t even know his name). I always thought it would be so cool to be powerful and important. But…I guess it would be really stressful to have to give speeches and stuff all the time. And solve everyone’s problems and deal with the blue sages.

So now I think it would be better to be the Avatar’s sidekick: all the adventure and excitement without the responsibility. Of course, I’ll never get to do any of that if I’m stuck in this awful town forever!!

Anyway, I guess I don’t have anything else to say. Yay, I killed a whole ten minutes writing this… Time to sit here and do nothing until bedtime.

My life stinks!

Saph underlined the final word with such fierceness that it cut through the page, then she shut the leatherbound book with a snap and tossed it down to the foot of her bed. With an annoyed huff, she flopped over onto her stomach and smashed her face into the pillow to let out a frustrated groan.

It wasn’t unusual for her to think of a certain person when she was upset. Now was one of those times.

I wish you were here, Gran. You always knew the right things to say. You told me being a teenager would be hard but I had no idea just how hard. Why’d you have to go and die when I needed you the most??

She let herself cry, lying there face down like a corpse. Gran had always said it was okay to cry, that the tears were good for her skin. ‘You’ll come out of it feeling better—and glowing, to boot,’ she’d say, wiping Saph’s cheeks with her thumb.

That had been almost four years ago, only six months before she’d passed away. It felt like yesterday. Thinking of her, Saph drifted off into a deep sleep.

“I’m gonna be the best firebender in the world!” A much younger version of Saph jumped between the vines while she shot little spurts of fire from her fists. The flames were quickly extinguished by the heavy, humid air. 

“I don’t doubt it,” the old woman said. “But remember—it has to be a secret.”

“I know, Gran.” She stopped and turned her face up, pouting. “I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I. It’s just the way it is.” Her wrinkled hand lifted into the air and sent a spiral of mud around Saph’s small body, eliciting a shrieking giggle. “Don’t worry, you’ll learn other ways to firebend that won’t get you into trouble.”

“Boring ways! I wanna fight!”

“Come, sit down. My old bones are hurting from trying to walk through this place.” They got settled on a particularly thick vine, side by side. “Who do you want to fight, hm?”

“The blue sages! I hate them! I want them to go away!”

“Well… If you really want to change the world one day, remember this: It’s not as fun as it appears to be. Being a hero comes with a heavy price.”

BAM BAM BAM

“Saph, get up! Now! You’re gonna be late!”

“I’m up, I’m up!”

But she wasn’t. At the moment, she was still face down on her pillow. Tired. Sweating. Tears lingered in her eyes from the dream.

I miss you, Gran.

A minute or so later, she reluctantly pushed herself upright and wiped the drool from the corner of her mouth. A mighty yawn made her jaw crack and pop painfully.

The door flew open and banged against the wall, revealing her mother and the screaming toddler in her arms. A stranger would’ve assumed the still-youthful woman was Saph’s older sister, and the child her niece rather than her baby sister. All three had the same black hair and blue eyes.

“If you want breakfast, you better be out here in the next thirty seconds!”

“You could try knocking!” Saph shot back. 

“I did knock! Multiple times!”

“But you can’t just barge in! What if I’d been naked?!”

“The horror!” Mara said sarcastically. She rolled her eyes and walked away.

Saph finally got up, grumbling wordless complaints under her breath, and went out to the kitchen. A steaming skillet of scrambled eggs caught her attention immediately and she hurried over to fill her plate, the argument forgotten.

“Not so much,” Mara said, her tone gentler now but holding a distinct weariness. She shifted Lia to her other hip and tried to placate her with a wooden toy. “Your father hasn’t eaten yet. There’s some bread to fill you up a little more.”

The only response to her words was an audible growl from Saph’s stomach while she dejectedly put a little bit back in the skillet. It was the same every day. She’d grown like a weed in the last year, surpassing her petite mother in height, and there was never quite enough food for her.

Her dad emerged while she ate, planting a quick kiss on the top of her head before serving his own plate. Like Mara, he was far too young to have a teenage daughter, but there they were—a weird little family.

Saph noticed a folded piece of paper sticking out of his pocket right before he sat down at the table.

“Is that a letter?” she asked around a mouthful of food, thinking of the other person she considered family and who was due for a visit. “Is it from Nani??”

“It sure is,” Jojin said, green eyes smiling. “She’s coming this week and plans to stay for at least a month.”

“Yes!” Saph was instantly filled with eager excitement and shoveled the food into her mouth as if that would somehow make Nani come sooner. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her mother frown. “Mom? What’s with the face?”

“Hm? …Oh, it’s nothing. I was just…thinking about my day. Trying to plan. Make sure you come straight home after your session because I have to work.”

“Hmph. If Lia tears up the floor again, it’s not my fault, okay?”

Mara was crouching to set her down and didn’t bother to turn around to respond. “I’ll fix it when I get home. Just make sure she doesn’t hurt herself.”

“And feed her and change her and entertain her and everything else…”

“We’re a family and we’ve all got to chip in,” Jojin said pointedly, though he softened it with a smile. “You don’t have to like it but you still gotta do it.”

Once her plate was empty—which was about ten seconds later—Saph was chivvied back into her room to get dressed. A small, dirty mirror sat atop her dresser and she looked into it with a sigh while she brushed her hair and hastily put it up. 

It wasn’t that she was ugly. Just…normal-looking. Her face still had the roundness of childhood and she was beginning to think it would always be that way.

She wanted to be beautiful. She wanted people to stop and look at her with awe and envy when she passed by. But most of all, she wanted to live in a world where such a thing wouldn’t be dangerous. Blending in was a blessing. She knew it well. And she hated it.

A few minutes later, she was practically shoved out the door.

‘You can’t miss any sessions,’ her mother had warned at the beginning of this tribulation, weeks ago. ‘It’s too expensive.’

Then why are you making me go in the first place?! Saph thought furiously for the umpteenth time as she walked through the muddy streets of Dao-Shu. The sprawling, ramshackle town on the edge of the swamp wasn’t exactly bustling, but there were enough people out and about to make her uncomfortable.

A blue sage with her signature tattooed forehead came around a corner and Saph flinched, giving her a wide berth. The inked third eye was eerily similar in color to her own blue eyes. It was deeply unsettling. But the woman paid her no mind and kept walking. 

Fortunately, Saph’s destination was the next house. She didn’t even need to knock; the door opened as soon as she approached the threshold.

“Good morning, Sapphire,” Yura said warmly as she stepped back to let her pass before closing the door. She had wild gray hair that was kinked into tight curls. Faint wrinkles on the corners of her eyes and around her mouth became more pronounced when she smiled. 

“It’s Saph.” How many times did she need to say it?

“Of course, my apologies. How are you today, Saph?”

“Okay.” She shrugged and awkwardly wrapped her arms around herself as if it would shield her from the upcoming conversation.

“Let’s sit down and have a cup of tea. And I know how much you liked those tea biscuits last time, so I made sure to make extra today!”

Honestly, the only reason Saph even put up with these sessions—however reluctantly—was for the snacks. Every little bit was appreciated.

“So,” Yura said once they were settled in the living room. It was a cozy space—small, but with a lived-in feel and enough decor to betray that it’s owner made a decent living. “How is your journaling going?”

Another shrug. She reached for a biscuit to dunk in her tea, which was far too hot to actually drink. “Okay, I guess.”

“And have you had any more dreams about Yin since we last talked?”

“Of course. I dream about her almost every night.” Saph paused with a pensive frown as an ache spread out through her chest. “Not last night, though. I– I dreamed about Gran, instead.”

“Mm. You must miss her.”

“I’m okay.” She wasn’t, but that was beside the point. It still felt so fresh some days, despite having been years.

“Do you want to talk about her?”

Saph considered the question. The last thing she wanted to do was get emotional and start crying, but… The only other option was to talk about Yin, which was the whole point of these sessions, yet not something she was eager to do, given the fact that—apparently—it was ‘unhealthy’ and ‘concerning’ for a teenager to have an ‘imaginary friend’.

She internally rolled her eyes at all the words used by the adults in her life, spoken in shadowy corners when they didn’t know they were being overheard. They would never understand.

When she didn’t answer, Yura said, “Why don’t we talk about Yin?” So predictable. “How about you tell me about your last dream about her?”

“It was the same as all the others. A large meadow with mountains all around. She was sitting in the grass and I sat across from her.” 

Saph tried hard to remain neutral. Simple descriptions only. It was so embarrassing, talking about Yin now that everyone was making a big deal about it. Before, she had happily gone on and on about her best friend—her only friend, really. All the silly little games had been met with support and enthusiasm because they kept her entertained. 

Not anymore. Now everyone just thought she was weird. 

“Have you ever seen her clearly?” Yura asked. “Or is she always hazy and vague when you dream of her?”

“Always the same. Like flames and smoke from a fire.” It was something that flowed from her mouth automatically, as often as she’d said it.

Yura looked at her silently for a few moments, a placid smile on her face. Saph really didn’t understand what the point of all this was. The woman had so far done nothing to make her feel better about anything in her life. She’d just asked questions, mostly.

“Fire…” she mused as if to herself. “I wonder if that’s significant. Subconsciously, I mean. You’re a firebender, after all. It’s no surprise that there might be a correlation in your mind.”

Whatever that means… “I guess.” 

“Do you think that the rumors these past several years of the sickness affecting benders might be connected in some way? Perhaps a latent worry manifesting? Some way for you to try and have some control over your life?”

At that, Saph scowled, not pleased by the implication that Yin was just a hallucination that she’d conjured. “No. Yin has always been there.”

Her stomach growled in the heavy silence that followed and she grabbed another handful of biscuits. She thought she caught a glimpse of something in Yura’s expression—a hint of consternation—before it was replaced once again by an amused smile.

“I bet you eat your parents out of house and home with an appetite like that,” she joked. 

“Yeah,” Saph agreed around a mouthful. “Dunno why they’re paying for this when they could’ve spent the money on food…”

The smile slipped once again and Yura fixed her with a penetrating gaze. “May I say something to you in confidence?”

“Okay…?”

There was a brief hesitation before she continued. “Your parents didn’t pay for these sessions.”

Saph swallowed hard, surprised by the admission. “Who– Who did? Nani?”

“No, it wasn’t her. A different woman, tall with black hair. She didn’t tell me her name.”

That didn’t make any sense to Saph whatsoever. “Why are you telling me this?”

“I just wanted you to know that you don’t need to choose between food and talking to me. It’s all taken care of.”

“But why wouldn’t my parents have told me?”

“I’m sure they have their reasons. Perhaps they were simply embarrassed.”

The rest of the hour passed slowly, Saph trying her best to pretend that she was fine and didn’t really need to be doing this. 

Yura was apparently unconvinced. “See you next week,” she said cheerfully, once it was over.

“Yeah. See ya.”

Despite her mother’s command, Saph didn’t go straight home. She was hungry and knew it would be hours until lunchtime, so she headed to the marketplace to steal a meat pie. It wasn’t difficult; she was well-practiced and the blue sages didn’t pay much attention to crime. The only problem was that she had to be careful not to do it too often in the same place or the sellers would start to recognize her.

With her hands in her pockets as she casually strolled past the cart, Saph ‘tripped’ and swiped the nearest pie as she fell.

“Hey, watch it!” the owner yelled, steadying his cart as it rocked from the slight impact.

“Sorry!” She quickly stashed pie and got up to run off, hiding a smile at her stealthiness.

She didn’t even make it around the corner.

“Nice try!” a booming voice said as it reached out and grabbed her wrist.

Saph yelped as she was jerked backward. Her heart began to pound furiously, feeling herself get wrapped up in a thick, muscled arm while the man’s other hand began rifling through her pockets.

He was so strong and squeezing so tightly against her neck. Black specks began to appear in her vision and panic set in.

Gotta…get…away… Reason was lost to her. She couldn’t breathe. The only thing in her mind was escape, at any cost. She brought her hand up to his forearm and let the chi flow. The heat was already built up within her, adrenaline pumping. It was so easy, really. Without thought, she released the energy and he growled in pain. It was enough for him to loosen his grip and let her wriggle away.

Run. Run, Saph. Just run!

But something caught her ankle and she hit the ground hard. There was no temperance left—no caution whatsoever—and she blindly rolled to spew fire from her palms in a desperate attempt to get away.

The shriek of pain from the man was far louder than the last one, drawing unwanted attention. Boots crunched in the gravel and Saph—still trying to get her bearings and grasp what had happened—found herself being hauled to her feet.

A burlap sack was shoved over her head as someone wrenched her arms behind her and tied them with coarse rope.

“Let me go!” she screamed, struggling in vain to free herself. “I didn’t mean it! I’m sorry! Please, let me go!” It was no use, though: She was well and truly trussed. Pure fear began to overwhelm her and tears spilled from her eyes. Why did I do it?? Why did I firebend?? 

Through her sobs, she tried to ask where they were taking her, but nothing resembling actual words made it out of her mouth. They were half-carrying, half-dragging her away to an unknown location.

She’d heard the stories. Her captor was a blue sage, she was almost certain—maybe even the one in the street earlier. Using bending to fight almost always resulted in a swift punishment if one of them happened to witness such a display, but it was rumored that the young ones were occasionally apprehended for some mysterious purpose.

Some told tales of being taken to a jail cell, questioned, roughed up, then released. Others said they had friends and family members who mysteriously vanished. Almost none got away unscathed.

I might never see Mom and Dad again… Or Lia… Or Nani… 

Thoughts of Yin swirled around her head as she felt herself being loaded up into a cart full of straw. Whoever they were and whatever they wanted, no one could take Yin away from her. She was only a dream away.

~~~~~

Read the rest of the chapter on AO3 or FFN!

[keicordelle]

Fluffvember Day 7 : Sunset - Aymeric

Brilliant orange and red streaked the sky as we made our way up to the cliff that overlooked Ishgard, the sky clear for once of all but the faintest wisps of cloud. The Holy See made for a dark silhouette against the sunset, and I wished for a moment that I could paint the image it presented, hope illuminating our saint city for the first time in a millennium.

"Perhaps a sunrise would be more fitting," Estinien suggested when I remarked on the desire, but I shook my head.

"A sunset, that we not forget those who sacrificed themselves for this future to be possible. Brilliant and beautiful, but with a certain measure of sorrow."

"Ah. You're right, that is fitting," he agreed as we crested the hill at last and the cliff came into view. The lone gravestone that adorned it was dark against the color splashed over the horizon, a melancholic counterpoint to the landscape's brilliance, complementing the grey spires of Ishgard in the distance. A location carefully chosen for exactly this view, that its patron might continue to watch over the city even in death.

Estinien caught my hand as we moved to kneel before it, a gentle breeze ruffling our hair like the greeting of a long lost friend. Estinien shot me an uncertain look, and I squeezed at his hand in reassurance but kept my peace, allowing him to find his way without intruding on his sepulchral tribute. "Hello Haurchefant," he started softly, laying out the flower we'd brought before the stone. "I'm sorry I missed your funeral. I asked Aymeric to show me here at least so I could pay my respects - and offer my gratitude." He fell silent, eyes wandering from the stone to the sunset beyond. He was quiet for long enough that I wasn't sure he was going to speak again, and when he did, his voice was so hushed I almost missed the words, carried away on the wind to Halone's hallowed halls. "We wouldn't be here if not for you. So thank you."

If he had any more words to offer, he kept them to himself, the thoughtful look on his face suggesting he was caught in his own memories. I bowed my head, paying my own silent respects to our departed friend, Estinien's hand in mine a steady reminder of what might have been lost if not for his sacrifice. It was only thanks to Haurchefant that Ishgard remained safe, that Thordan had been vanquished and a new era of peace allowed to prosper, and though I felt his loss keenly, I was grateful for all that his valor had allowed us to accomplish. I could only dream of ever being so worthy a knight as he.

We stayed like that, hand in hand before the grave of our lost friend until the sun sank below the horizon and the bright colors faded into darkness, leaving the stars to twinkle brightly overhead, rivaled only by the shining lights of the Holy See in the distance. "We'd best head back. Haurchefant certainly wouldn't want us to catch cold in his name," I joked lightly, and Estinien started, my voice breaking through his silent reverie at last.

"Aye, you're right." He stood, brushing snow from his knees before reaching to take my hand once more and casting one final look at the tombstone. "Thank you again Haurchefant. For everything."

[Masterlist] | [Ao3]

[concupiscience]

BERENICE — A TALE.

BY EDGAR A. POE.

MISERY is manifold. The wretchedness of earth is multiform. Overreaching the wide horizon like the rainbow, its hues are as various as the hues of that arch, as distinct too, yet as intimately blended. Overreaching the wide horizon like the rainbow! How is it that from Beauty I have derived a type of unloveliness? — from the covenant of Peace a simile of sorrow? But thus is it. And as, in ethics, Evil is a consequence of Good, so, in fact, out of Joy is sorrow born. Either the memory of past bliss is the anguish of to-day, or the agonies which are, have their origin in the ecstasies which might have been. I have a tale to tell in its own essence rife with horror — I would suppress it were it not a record more of feelings than of facts.

My baptismal name is Egæus — that of my family I will not mention. Yet there are no towers in the land more time-honored than my gloomy, grey, hereditary halls. Our line has been called a race of visionaries: and in many striking particulars — in the character of the family mansion — in the frescos of the chief saloon — in the tapestries of the dormitories — in the chiseling of some buttresses in the armory — but more especially in the gallery of antique paintings — in the fashion of the library chamber — and, lastly, in the very peculiar nature of the library's contents, there is more than sufficient evidence to warrant the belief.

The recollections of my earliest years are connected with that chamber, and with its volumes — of which latter I will say no more. Here died my mother. Herein was I born. But it is mere idleness to say that I had not lived before — that the soul has no previous existence. You deny it. Let us not argue the matter. Convinced myself I seek not to convince. There is, however, a remembrance of ærial forms — of spiritual and meaning eyes — of sounds musical yet sad — a remembrance which will not be excluded: a memory like a shadow, vague, variable, indefinite, unsteady — and like a shadow too, in the impossibility of my getting rid of it, while the sunlight of my reason shall exist.

In that chamber was I born. Thus awaking, as it were, from the long night of what seemed, but was not, nonentity at once into the very regions of fairy land — into a palace of imagination — into the wild dominions of monastic thought and erudition — it is not singular that I gazed around me with a startled and ardent eye — that I loitered away my boyhood in books, and dissipated my youth in reverie — but it is singular that as years rolled away, and the noon of manhood found me still in the mansion of my fathers — it is wonderful what stagnation there fell upon the springs of my life — wonderful how total an inversion took place in the character of my common thoughts. The realities of the world affected me as visions, and as visions only, while the wild ideas of the land of dreams became, in turn, — not the material of my every-day existence — but in very deed that existence utterly and solely in itself.

  * * * * * *  

Berenice and I were cousins, and we grew up together in my paternal halls — Yet differently we grew. I ill of health and buried in gloom — she agile, graceful, and overflowing with energy. Hers the ramble on the hill [column 2:] side [[hill-side]] — mine the studies of the cloister. I living within my own heart, and addicted body and soul to the most intense and painful meditation — she roaming carelessly through life with no thought of the shadows in her path, or the silent flight of the raven-winged hours. Berenice! — I call upon her name — Berenice! — and from the grey ruins of memory a thousand tumultuous recollections are startled at the sound! Ah! vividly is her image before me now, as in the early days of her light-heartedness and joy! Oh! gorgeous yet fantastic beauty! Oh! Sylph amid the shrubberies of Arnheim! — Oh! Naiad among her fountains! — and then — then all is mystery and terror, and a tale which should not be told. Disease — a fatal disease — fell like the Simoom upon her frame, and, even while I gazed upon her, the spirit of change swept over her, pervading her mind, her habits, and her character, and, in a manner the most subtle and terrible, disturbing even the very identity of her person! Alas! the destroyer came and went, and the victim — where was she? I knew her not — or knew her no longer as Berenice.

Among the numerous train of maladies, superinduced by that fatal and primary one which effected a revolution of so horrible a kind in the moral and physical being of my cousin, may be mentioned as the most distressing and obstinate in its nature, a species of epilepsy not unfrequently terminating in trance itself — trance very nearly resembling positive dissolution, and from which her manner of recovery was, in most instances, startlingly abrupt. In the meantime my own disease — for I have been told that I should call it by no other appellation — my own disease, then, grew rapidly upon me, and, aggravated in its symptoms by the immoderate use of opium, assumed finally a monomaniac character of a novel and extraordinary form — hourly and momentarily gaining vigor — and at length obtaining over me the most singular and incomprehensible ascendancy. This monomania — if I must so term it — consisted in a morbid irritability of the nerves immediately affecting those properties of the mind, in metaphysical science termed the attentive. It is more than probable that I am not understood — but I fear that it is indeed in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general reader, an adequate idea of that nervous intensity of interest with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak technically) busied, and, as it were, buried themselves in the contemplation of even the most common objects of the universe.

To muse for long unwearied hours with my attention rivetted to some frivolous device upon the margin, or in the typography of a book — to become absorbed for the better part of a summer's day in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry, or upon the floor — to lose myself for an entire night in watching the steady flame of a lamp, or the embers of a fire — to dream away whole days over the perfume of a flower — to repeat monotonously some common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent repetition, ceased to convey any idea whatever to the mind — to lose all sense of motion or physical existence in a state of absolute bodily quiescence long and obstinately persevered in — Such were a few of the most common and least pernicious vagaries induced by a condition of the mental faculties, not, indeed, altogether unparalleled, but certainly bidding defiance to any thing like analysis or explanation. [page 334:]

Yet let me not be misapprehended. The undue, intense, and morbid attention thus excited by objects in their own nature frivolous, must not be confounded in character with that ruminating propensity common to all mankind, and more especially indulged in by persons of ardent imagination. By no means. It was not even, as might be at first supposed, an extreme condition, or exaggeration of such propensity, but primarily and essentially distinct and different. In the one instance the dreamer, or enthusiast, being interested by an object usually not frivolous, imperceptibly loses sight of this object in a wilderness of deductions and suggestions issuing therefrom, until, at the conclusion of a day-dream often replete with luxury, he finds the incitamentum or first cause of his musings utterly vanished and forgotten. In my case the primary object was invariably frivolous, although assuming, through the medium of my distempered vision, a refracted and unreal importance. Few deductions — if any — were made; and those few pertinaciously returning in, so to speak, upon the original object as a centre. The meditations were never pleasurable; and, at the termination of the reverie, the first cause, so far from being out of sight, had attained that supernaturally exaggerated interest which was the prevailing feature of the disease. In a word, the powers of mind more particularly exercised were, with me, as I have said before, the attentive, and are, with the day-dreamer, the speculative.

My books, at this epoch, if they did not actually serve to irritate the disorder, partook, it will be perceived, largely, in their imaginative, and inconsequential nature, of the characteristic qualities of the disorder itself. I well remember, among others, the treatise of the noble Italian Cœlius [[Cælius]] Secundus Curio “de amplitudine beati regni Dei” — St. Austin's great work the “City of God” — and Tertullian [[Tertullian's]] “de Carne Christi,” in which the unintelligible sentence “Mortuus est Dei filius; credibile est quia ineptum est: et sepultus resurrexit; certum est quia impossibile est” occupied my undivided time, for many weeks of laborious and fruitless investigation.

Thus it will appear that, shaken from its balance only by trivial things, my reason bore resemblance to that ocean-crag spoken of by Ptolemy Hephestion, which steadily resisting the attacks of human violence, and the fiercer fury of the waters and the winds, trembled only to the touch of the flower called Asphodel. And although, to a careless thinker, it might appear a matter beyond doubt, that the fearful alteration produced by her unhappy malady, in the moral condition of Berenice, would afford me many objects for the exercise of that intense and morbid meditation whose nature I have been at some trouble in explaining, yet such was not by any means the case. In the lucid intervals of my infirmity, her calamity indeed gave me pain, and, taking deeply to heart that total wreck of her fair and gentle life, I did not fail to ponder frequently and bitterly upon the wonder-working means by which so strange a revolution had been so suddenly brought to pass. But these reflections partook not of the idiosyncrasy of my disease, and were such as would have occurred, under similar circumstances, to the ordinary mass of mankind. True to its own character, my disorder revelled in the less important but more startling changes wrought in the physical frame of Berenice, and [column 2:] in the singular and most appalling distortion of her personal identity.

During the brightest days of her unparalleled beauty, most surely I had never loved her. In the strange anomaly of my existence, feelings, with me, had never been of the heart, and my passions always were of the mind. Through the grey of the early morning — among the trellissed shadows of the forest at noon-day — and in the silence of my library at night, she had flitted by my eyes, and I had seen her — not as the living and breathing Berenice, but as the Berenice of a dream — not as a being of the earth — earthly — but as the abstraction of such a being — not as a thing to admire, but to analyze — not as an object of love, but as the theme of the most abstruse although desultory speculation. And now — now I shuddered in her presence, and grew pale at her approach; yet, bitterly lamenting her fallen and desolate condition, I knew that she had loved me long, and, in an evil moment, I spoke to her of marriage.

And at length the period of our nuptials was approaching, when, upon an afternoon in the winter of the year, one of those unseasonably warm, calm, and misty days which are the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon,* I sat, and sat, as I thought alone, in the inner apartment of the library. But uplifting my eyes Berenice stood before me.

Was it my own excited imagination — or the misty influence of the atmosphere — or the uncertain twilight of the chamber — or the grey draperies which fell around her figure — that caused it to loom up in so unnatural a degree? I could not tell. Perhaps she had grown taller since her malady. She spoke, however, no word, and I — not for worlds could I have uttered a syllable. An icy chill ran through my frame; a sense of insufferable anxiety oppressed me; a consuming curiosity pervaded my soul; and, sinking back upon the chair, I remained for some time breathless, and motionless, and with my eyes rivetted upon her person. Alas! its emaciation was excessive, and not one vestige of the former being lurked in any single line of the contour. My burning glances at length fell upon her face.

The forehead was high, and very pale, and singularly placid; and the once golden hair fell partially over it, and overshadowed the hollow temples with ringlets now black as the raven's ring [[wing]], and jarring discordantly, in their fantastic character, with the reigning melancholy of the countenance. The eyes were lifeless, and lustreless, and I shrunk involuntarily from their glassy stare to the contemplation of the thin and shrunken lips. They parted: and, in a smile of peculiar meaning, the teeth of the changed Berenice disclosed themselves slowly to my view. Would to God that I had never beheld them, or that, having done so, I had died!

  * * * * * *  

The shutting of a door disturbed me, and, looking up, I found my cousin had departed from the chamber. But from the disordered chamber of my brain, had not, alas! departed, and would not be driven away, the white and ghastly spectrum of the teeth. Not a speck upon their surface — not a shade on their enamel — not a line in their configuration — not an indenture in their [page 335:] edges — but what that period of her smile had sufficed to brand in upon my memory. I saw them now even more unequivocally than I beheld them then. The teeth! — the teeth! — they were here, and there, and every where, and visibly, and palpably before me, long, narrow, and excessively white, with the pale lips writhing about them, as in the very moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full fury of my monomania, and I struggled in vain against its strange and irresistible influence. In the multiplied objects of the external world I had no thoughts but for the teeth. All other matters and all different interests became absorbed in their single contemplation. They — they alone were present to the mental eye, and they, in their sole individuality, became the essence of my mental life. I held them in every light — I turned them in every attitude. I surveyed their characteristics — I dwelt upon their peculiarities — I pondered upon their conformation — I mused upon the alteration in their nature — and shuddered as I assigned to them in imagination a sensitive and sentient power, and even when unassisted by the lips, a capability of moral expression. Of Mad'selle Sallé it has been said, “que tous ses pas etoient [[etaient]] des sentiments,” and of Berenice I more seriously believed que touts ses dents etaient des ideés.

And the evening closed in upon me thus — and then the darkness came, and tarried, and went — and the day again dawned — and the mists of a second night were now gathering around — and still I sat motionless in that solitary room, and still I sat buried in meditation, and still the phantasma of the teeth maintained its terrible ascendancy as, with the most vivid and hideous distinctness, it floated about amid the changing lights and shadows of the chamber. At length there broke forcibly in upon my dreams a wild cry as of horror and dismay; and thereunto, after a pause, succeeded the sound of troubled voices intermingled with many low moanings of sorrow, or of pain. I arose hurriedly from my seat, and, throwing open one of the doors of the library, there stood out in the antechamber a servant maiden, all in tears, and she told me that Berenice was — no more. Seized with an epileptic fit she had fallen dead in the early morning, and now, at the closing in of the night, the grave was ready for its tenant, and all the preparations for the burial were completed.

With a heart full of grief, yet reluctantly, and oppressed with awe, I made my way to the bed-chamber of the departed. The room was large, and very dark, and at every step within its gloomy precincts I encountered the paraphernalia of the grave. The coffin, so a menial told me, lay surrounded by the curtains of yonder bed, and in that coffin, he whisperingly assured me, was all that remained of Berenice. Who was it asked me would I not look upon the corpse? I had seen the lips of no one move, yet the question had been demanded, and the echo of the syllables still lingered in the room. It was impossible to refuse; and with a sense of suffocation I dragged myself to the side of the bed. Gently I uplifted the sable draperies of the curtains.

As I let them fall they descended upon my shoulders, and shutting me thus out from the living, enclosed me in the strictest communion with the deceased.

The very atmosphere was redolent of death. The peculiar smell of the coffin sickened me; and I fancied [column 2:] a deleterious odor was already exhaling from the body. I would have given worlds to escape — to fly from the pernicious influence of mortality — to breathe once again the pure air of the eternal heavens. But I had no longer the power to move — my knees tottered beneath me — and I remained rooted to the spot, and gazing upon the frightful length of the rigid body as it lay outstretched in the dark coffin without a lid.

God of heaven! — is it possible? Is it my brain that reels — or was it indeed the finger of the enshrouded dead that stirred in the white cerement that bound it? Frozen with unutterable awe I slowly raised my eyes to the countenance of the corpse. There had been a band around the jaws, but, I know not how, it was broken asunder. The livid lips were wreathed into a species of smile, and, through the enveloping gloom, once again there glared upon me in too palpable reality, the white and glistening, and ghastly teeth of Berenice. I sprang convulsively from the bed, and, uttering no word, rushed forth a maniac from that apartment of triple horror, and mystery, and death.

  * * * * * *  

I found myself again sitting in the library, and again sitting there alone. It seemed that I had newly awakened from a confused and exciting dream. I knew that it was now midnight, and I was well aware that since the setting of the sun Berenice had been interred. But of that dreary period which had intervened I had no positive, at least no definite comprehension. Yet its memory was rife with horror — horror more horrible from being vague, and terror more terrible from ambiguity. It was a fearful page in the record of my existence, written all over with dim, and hideous, and unintelligible recollections. I strived to decypher them, but in vain — while ever and anon, like the spirit of a departed sound, the shrill and piercing shriek of a female voice seemed to be ringing in my ears. I had done a deed — what was it? And the echoes of the chamber answered me — “what was it?”

On the table beside me burned a lamp, and near it lay a little box of ebony. It was a box of no remarkable character, and I had seen it frequently before, it being the property of the family physician; but how came it there upon my table, and why did I shudder in regarding it? These things were in no manner to be accounted for, and my eyes at length dropped to the open pages of a book, and to a sentence underscored therein. The words were the singular but simple words of the poet Ebn Zaiat. “Dicebant mihi sodales si sepulchrum amicæ visit arem [[visitarem]] curas meas aliquantulum fore levatas.”* Why then, as I perused them, did the hairs of my head erect themselves on end, and the blood of my body congeal within my veins?

There came a light tap at the library door, and, pale as the tenant of a tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe. His looks were wild with terror, and he spoke to me in a voice tremulous, husky, and very low. What said he? — some broken sentences I heard. He told of a wild cry heard in the silence of the night — of the gathering together of the household — of a search in the direction of the sound — and then his tones grew thrillingly distinct as he whispered me of a violated grave — [page 336:] of a disfigured body discovered upon its margin — a body enshrouded, yet still breathing, still palpitating, still alive!

He pointed to my garments — they were muddy and clotted with gore. I spoke not, and he took me gently by the hand — but it was indented with the impress of human nails. He directed my attention to some object against the wall — I looked at it for some minutes — it was a spade. With a shriek I bounded to the table, and grasped the ebony box that lay upon it. But I could not force it open, and in my tremor it slipped from out my hands, and fell heavily, and burst into pieces, and from it, with a rattling sound, there rolled out some instruments of dental surgery, intermingled with many white and glistening substances that were scattered to and fro about the floor.

 

[[Footnotes]]

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 334, column 2:]

*For as Jove, during the winter season, gives twice seven days of warmth, men have called this clement and temperate time the nurse of the beautiful Halcyon. — Simonides.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 335, column 2:]

*My companions told me I might find some little alleviation of my misery, in visiting the grave of my beloved.

 

[allegedlyfunny]

Moby-Dick by:Herman Melville

CHAPTER 1. Loomings

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off—then, I account it high time tozz get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me.

There now is your insular city of the Manhattoes, belted round by wharves as Indian isles by coral reefs—commerce surrounds it with her surf. Right and left, the streets take you waterward. Its extreme downtown is the battery, where that noble mole is washed by waves, and cooled by breezes, which a few hours previous were out of sight of land. Look at the crowds of water-gazers there.

Circumambulate the city of a dreamy Sabbath afternoon. Go from Corlears Hook to Coenties Slip, and from thence, by Whitehall, northward. What do you see?—Posted like silent sentinels all around the town, stand thousands upon thousands of mortal men fixed in ocean reveries. Some leaning against the spiles; some seated upon the pier-heads; some looking over the bulwarks of ships from China; some high aloft in the rigging, as if striving to get a still better seaward peep. But these are all landsmen; of week days pent up in lath and plaster— tied to counters, nailed to benches, clinched to desks. How then is this? Are the green fields gone? What do they here?

But look! here come more crowds, pacing straight for the water, and seemingly bound for a dive. Strange! Nothing will content them but the extremest limit of the land; loitering under the shady lee of yonder warehouses will not suffice. No. They must get just as nigh the water as they possibly can without falling in. And there they stand—miles of them—leagues. Inlanders all, they come from lanes and alleys, streets and avenues,— north, east, south, and west. Yet here they all unite. Tell me, does the magnetic virtue of the needles of the compasses of all those ships attract them thither?

Once more. Say you are in the country; in some high land of lakes. Take almost any path you please, and ten to one it carries you down in a dale, and leaves you there by a pool in the stream. There is magic in it. Let the most absent-minded of men be plunged in his deepest reveries—stand that man on his legs, set his feet a-going, and he will infallibly lead you to water, if water there be in all that region. Should you ever be athirst in the great American desert, try this experiment, if your caravan happen to be supplied with a metaphysical professor. Yes, as every one knows, meditation and water are wedded for ever.

But here is an artist. He desires to paint you the dreamiest, shadiest, quietest, most enchanting bit of romantic landscape in all the valley of the Saco. What is the chief element he employs? There stand his trees, each with a hollow trunk, as if a hermit and a crucifix were within; and here sleeps his meadow, and there sleep his cattle; and up from yonder cottage goes a sleepy smoke. Deep into distant woodlands winds a mazy way, reaching to overlapping spurs of mountains bathed in their hill-side blue. But though the picture lies thus tranced, and though this pine-tree shakes down its sighs like leaves upon this shepherd’s head, yet all were vain, unless the shepherd’s eye were fixed upon the magic stream before him. Go visit the Prairies in June, when for scores on scores of miles you wade knee-deep among tiger-lilies—what is the one charm wanting?— Water— there is not a drop of water there! Were Niagara but a cataract of sand, would you travel your thousand miles to see it? Why did the poor poet of Tennessee, upon suddenly receiving two handfuls of silver, deliberate whether to buy him a coat, which he sadly needed, or invest his money in a pedestrian trip to Rockaway Beach? Why is almost every robust healthy boy with a robust healthy soul in him, at some time or other crazy to go to sea? Why upon your first voyage as a passenger, did you yourself feel such a mystical vibration, when first told that you and your ship were now out of sight of land? Why did the old Persians hold the sea holy? Why did the Greeks give it a separate deity, and own brother of Jove? Surely all this is not without meaning. And still deeper the meaning of that story of Narcissus, who because he could not grasp the tormenting, mild image he saw in the fountain, plunged into it and was drowned. But that same image, we ourselves see in all rivers and oceans. It is the image of the ungraspable phantom of life; and this is the key to it all.

Now, when I say that I am in the habit of going to sea whenever I begin to grow hazy about the eyes, and begin to be over conscious of my lungs, I do not mean to have it inferred that I ever go to sea as a passenger. For to go as a passenger you must needs have a purse, and a purse is but a rag unless you have something in it. Besides, passengers get sea-sick— grow quarrelsome—don’t sleep of nights—do not enjoy themselves much, as a general thing;—no, I never go as a passenger; nor, though I am something of a salt, do I ever go to sea as a Commodore, or a Captain, or a Cook. I abandon the glory and distinction of such offices to those who like them. For my part, I abominate all honourable respectable toils, trials, and tribulations of every kind whatsoever. It is quite as much as I can do to take care of myself, without taking care of ships, barques, brigs, schooners, and what not. And as for going as cook,—though I confess there is considerable glory in that, a cook being a sort of officer on ship-board—yet, somehow, I never fancied broiling fowls;—though once broiled, judiciously buttered, and judgmatically salted and peppered, there is no one who will speak more respectfully, not to say reverentially, of a broiled fowl than I will. It is out of the idolatrous dotings of the old Egyptians upon broiled ibis and roasted river horse, that you see the mummies of those creatures in their huge bake-houses the pyramids.

No, when I go to sea, I go as a simple sailor, right before the mast, plumb down into the forecastle, aloft there to the royal mast-head. True, they rather order me about some, and make me jump from spar to spar, like a grasshopper in a May meadow. And at first, this sort of thing is unpleasant enough. It touches one’s sense of honour, particularly if you come of an old established family in the land, the Van Rensselaers, or Randolphs, or Hardicanutes. And more than all, if just previous to putting your hand into the tar-pot, you have been lording it as a country schoolmaster, making the tallest boys stand in awe of you. The transition is a keen one, I assure you, from a schoolmaster to a sailor, and requires a strong decoction of Seneca and the Stoics to enable you to grin and bear it. But even this wears off in time.

What of it, if some old hunks of a sea-captain orders me to get a broom and sweep down the decks? What does that indignity amount to, weighed, I mean, in the scales of the New Testament? Do you think the archangel Gabriel thinks anything the less of me, because I promptly and respectfully obey that old hunks in that particular instance? Who ain’t a slave? Tell me that. Well, then, however the old sea-captains may order me about—however they may thump and punch me about, I have the satisfaction of knowing that it is all right; that everybody else is one way or other served in much the same way— either in a physical or metaphysical point of view, that is; and so the universal thump is passed round, and all hands should rub each other’s shoulder-blades, and be content.

Again, I always go to sea as a sailor, because they make a point of paying me for my trouble, whereas they never pay passengers a single penny that I ever heard of. On the contrary, passengers themselves must pay. And there is all the difference in the world between paying and being paid. The act of paying is perhaps the most uncomfortable infliction that the two orchard thieves entailed upon us. But being paid,— what will compare with it? The urbane activity with which a man receives money is really marvellous, considering that we so earnestly believe money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no account can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! how cheerfully we consign ourselves to perdition!

Finally, I always go to sea as a sailor, because of the wholesome exercise and pure air of the fore-castle deck. For as in this world, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if you never violate the Pythagorean maxim), so for the most part the Commodore on the quarter-deck gets his atmosphere at second hand from the sailors on the forecastle. He thinks he breathes it first; but not so. In much the same way do the commonalty lead their leaders in many other things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it. But wherefore it was that after having repeatedly smelt the sea as a merchant sailor, I should now take it into my head to go on a whaling voyage; this the invisible police officer of the Fates, who has the constant surveillance of me, and secretly dogs me, and influences me in some unaccountable way— he can better answer than any one else. And, doubtless, my going on this whaling voyage, formed part of the grand programme of Providence that was drawn up a long time ago. It came in as a sort of brief interlude and solo between more extensive performances. I take it that this part of the bill must have run something like this:—act them thither?

WHAT THE FUCK MAN 😭😭😭