PodCastle 644: Sea-Crowned

* Author : H. Pueyo

* Narrator : Kaitlyn Zivanovich

* Host : Summer Fletcher

* Audio Producer : Peter Adrian Behravesh

*

Discuss on Forums

Originally published by The Dark.

CW: Domestic abuse

Rated R.

Sea-Crowned

By H. Pueyo

Water — there’s water everywhere, water covering my feet, my knees, my hips. Water, foam, salt, sand in my mouth, waves crashing against this iron cage, pulling both it and me towards the depths. Once, I looked at the sea for comfort, to shelter my loneliness from your anger, but you took that away from me, like you took everything else.

We have the same blood, you and I, and yet . . . And yet I am the only one here, aren’t I?

We were found in the same basket, floating among the debris. Sometimes, I like to believe that we helped each other survive, or that our parents, whoever they might have been, protected us, guiding us to find the expedition team. Did they felt regret when they saw us there? Did guilt crossed their minds when the only survivors of a then fresh massacre appeared in front of them?

I can only imagine what happened next:

“This one doesn’t look like them,” one of the soldiers must have stated, holding you in their lap. “Look at his eyes — he could almost be one of ours.”

The most important word here: almost.

“Throw the monster back to the water,” the captain might have commanded. That’s why they feared us, after all. Our eyes, and our power. “Keep only the normal one.”

Only one person, vice-captain Adrião Lima, gave a contrary idea:

“I’ll take both to land, and get rid of the other one as soon as I am there. Their kind can’t die in the water.”

Yet choking a child to death is easier said than done. As you know, Adrião didn’t kill me, the child with the terrible eyes. Instead, he named you Martim and me Jamim, and kept you outside the house, and me inside.

Don’t get me wrong: I didn’t dislike the house, at first. As soon as I could walk, I ran through door frames, memorized how many wooden boards each room had, and knew every single color painting the kitchen’s ceramic tiles. Adrião didn’t talk to me, but you did, and I cherished every single word I learned, and repeated them when I was alone:

house, white, ceiling, brown, sky, blue (water, water, water)

birds, rats, ants, hands, hair, me (you, you, you)

You were kind, Martim, do you remember those days? You would run back home to play with me, and we would hide salt biscuits in a jar under the bed so I wouldn’t starve when you were out. At night, you slept with me, and, together, we dreamt of the sea.

“No one can ever see Jamim’s eyes,” Adrião told you more than once. “No one will ever accept it.”

“I don’t see anything wrong with your eyes,” you told me, in secret. I thought my eyes looked like yours, as our bedroom had no mirror, and I didn’t understand the problem, either.

“What is so different about me?” I asked, looking at the dry skin of my palms.

We were alone in the house, but you looked everywhere before voicing a word:

“Adrião doesn’t like to talk about it,” you said, checking the open windows. You were glowing under the sunshine, and, at that time, I imagined if my sallow face could ever be like yours, no matter how alike we were. “But I heard one of the soldiers saying something — saying . . .