For as long as Sieva could understand words (and possibly even before), his father had spoken to him of the sea. He himself has no memories of his ancestral home, but his father had spent his first decade in the floating kingdom of Dracia before it had fallen.
He spoke of marbled streets made of aquatic crystals. Of transparent spires that took on the hues of the sky. Of mythical divine beings who came from the seafloor to bless the Kingdom. His eyes would wander off the coast and to the ocean’s horizon, and sometimes it felt more like he was recounting the story for himself rather than Sieva.
Sometimes, he would be in a good mood and talk about daily life in the city. He would speak of the streets of crystal, reflecting moonlight and bathing the city in a soft, otherworldly glow by night and a golden hue by day. The docks, which stretched deep down underwater beneath the seaweed beds, filled with ships made of sea foam and rubbernecking tourists. The prism market situated on the back of the whale god Cetus, traveling from coast to coast in a carnival of rainbow tents, selling everything mundane and fantastical that the oceans could offer.
Other times he would be in a bad mood, and he would speak of the curse of the Orc. Of the death of the sea lords, and the severance of their divinity by the new gods of Genkov. Of the suffering of the Dracian people, who were unable to handle the divine power within them now that there was no higher power to regulate it.
He would speak of their current home, the lands of Prithia, and the beings who inhabited them. Their little tribe had been lucky, in that they only inherited the physical strength of the sea lords, and none of the more unstable aspects.
He would speak of the kings of Prithia, orcs who had inherited the more esoteric elements of the ocean. Incomplete gods who were more akin to forces of nature than sentient mortals.
Stolartz the mourner, who inherited the Siren. He sings of past glories, of a time where life was better and simpler. His voice compels listeners to try and reconstruct Dracia, building disgusting replicants of the lost city out of rocks, shit, corpses, and anything else that was available.
Jallantine the noble, inheritor of the Dolphin Court. Eternally seeking a kingdom but possessing no gold, no honor, only an endless tide of drowned carcesses. Though constantly adding new members to his court, his kingdom can preside over no living thing, and so he lives isolated in a land of eternal silence.
Sieva does not like it when his father speaks of such things. The already salty air of the Prithian coast becomes unbearably so, and he gags silently as the bitterness clings to his tongue. The leaf bunches they use as mats seem to become almost wet, clinging to his legs like tentacles. The sand feels sharp, like knives digging into his palms as he rests his hands on them. The light of the sun reflects off the beach like aquamarine gemstones. No matter how much he cries and begs, his father remains entranced in the story, ignoring him for hours on end until he eventually returns to the village after dark, skin smelling like salt and rotten seaweed.
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One day, he goes out to scavenge for berries, and comes home to find that his village has been replaced by a lake. His father stands in the middle, salt encrusting his legs up to the upper thighs. He smiles at Sieva and offers a hand to join him, but the smile is filled with bloodied coral and his arms drip with sea cucumbers and eels.
He is so entranced that he does not notice the arm, his mother’s arm, decorated with seashells and pearls that she so often wore. It grabs at his ankles and pulls.
He slips onto the sand, tiny seashells cutting grooves into his knees like the rings inside of tree marrow. He wrenches himself free using his inherited strength, and the hand dissolves back into foam. Spiked lacerations leave scars like jellyfish stings all along where his leg was grabbed.
Sieva turns and runs and never looks back. He shuts his ears to talk of Sintel and the Salt Swarm, and heads northwards into Genkov, intending to bury his past and submerge himself in the land of gods who killed his own.
Genkov was a land of metal, steam, and technology. It was there that he discovered civilization as it truly was. Not the raw struggle to survive from day to day in Prithia, but society, culture, and all the laws and regulations needed to make it work.
As a child, he had witnessed his tribe kill an outsider so that they would not starve for the winter. His mother had looked at him over the roasted arms and fingers that night and told him that the world was cruel. Genkov was by no means a paradise, but it was less cruel than his old home. In his mind, that made it worth fighting for.
For the next few years, he takes up residence along the iron coast, eeking out a living as a mechanic going from one ship to another, all while trying his best to learn as much as he can about the foundations of society, law, politics, and everything in between.
Though as much as he wants to, he is unable to make a future in Genkov. The aura of its gods was something he was biologically adverse to, and trying to enter the nation past the borders of the iron coast quite literally would poison him to death.
Instead, he travels westwards, boarding a trade vessel with the intent to reach Kepia, the land of magic. In many ways, the magic aura here was essentially identical to the divine miasma of Genkov. However, it affects him less so, and Sieva ends up falling in love with Kepia in the same way that he does with Genkov, only this time he’s actually able to set food more than 50 meters into the mainland without dying.
When Lily and him are traveling to the supposed alleyway where Gibet and Bedivere were, he suddenly gets a feeling in his gut, one eerily similar to what he felt that day when he returned to see his home changed into a lake. It gets stronger the closer they get to their destination, and maxes out when he sees Bedivere, one arm missing and sitting in a pool of gore.
It isn’t until they relocate into a small clearing in the city outskirts that he realizes why he feels this way.
The aura coming off of Bedivere was Genkovian. Moreso, it matched almost exactly what he had felt whenever he tried to go deeper into the mainland. They had to stop moving and set up a shelter because his nose had started bleeded while he was carrying her. Even now, looking at her brought about a migraine so strong that he could barely keep his eyes open.
By the time Gibet wakes up, it is already sunset. He shambles over like a drunkard, barely able to keep his balance. Lily’s physical body is still too damaged to move, so only Sieva looks up in reaction.
‘Gibet… what the fuck happened? Lily and I got attacked as well.’
‘I… I don’t know either… Bedivere pulled me aside to defend me and the next thing I remember is waking up in the alleyway covered in blood…’
‘...What the hell is happening? I mean… why did we even get attacked? Lily and I got targeted too, so does that mean someone was aiming for us since the beginning? I mean… What are we even supposed to do at this point?’
‘I can answer that!’
An unsettlingly bright, cheerful voice cuts through the breeze, causing all of them to stiffen. Sieva looks towards the voice, and sees his view of the sun being drowned out by the shadow of a woman. He isn’t able to see anything but her silhouette, but it’s a very distinctive one due to the large feathered sun hat sitting on her head. He hears Gibet stifle a gasp from behind him.
‘Hello Gibby, how have you been?’