by Rex Hazelton
Unlike mankind, who evolved into a more beast-like existence that was in tune with the dense muscles that motored them along, the waterkynd maintained a better grasp on the their origins and the magic that had given them birth. Because of this, they were set apart from the humans in more ways than the differences found in their essential make-up, they understood what lay beyond the veil of flesh that was drawn out of the warl of rock and soil and draped over mankind. Made of water, the waterkynd’s identity was not limited to one form. Instead, they were comfortable with change. And because of this, they were open to the concept of transformation with all of its implications. Changing from liquid, to vapor, and then to cloud bore no terror for them since they knew their essence would not be lost in the alteration. They would remain who they fundamentally were even if they chose to become rock hard ice. It was this understanding that unlocked the doors to other warls that lay beyond the carnal senses, those that were governed by laws all their own.
“Are you ready to jump?” A voice, sounding like a gentle brook bubbling along, spoke to the man who stood at the edge of the cliff.
Thin as an elf, though taller, the man pushed his cloak’s hood off his head. Running his hand through honey-colored hair that fell to his shoulders, he turned to look at the waterkynd who stood next to him. His dark brown eyes drank in the beauty of the female form who returned his gazed. Though made of glistening vapor, the waterkynd’s shape was as womanly as anything the man had beheld in his life. Her smile was more enchanting than an elf-maiden’s. Her eyes were as bright as polished silver.
“Let me enjoy the view a moment longer,” the young man replied. Crows’ feet appeared at the corner of his eyes as he smiled, those birthed by joy and not age since he was only twenty summers old. The crescent moon was reflected in his dark irises as he turned to look at Mythoria, the home of the waterkynd, a place he had grown to deeply love.
The waterkynd’s laughter was as light as a rivulet of wine being poured into a fragilely thin glass goblet. She loved the man who loved her home and all who lived there. How this came to pass was not hard to figure out since the two were kindred spirits whose view of things was amazingly similar. Both were creatures drawn to things esoteric. Both were given to reading between the lines, to seeing what others thought impossible to see. Both longed for more. And when they fell in love with each other, they got more than they ever dreamed of.
Never in the history of the warl had a human and waterkynd fallen in love. For this was not possible all thought, except for the two standing on top of the cliff that rose above the fern-laden realm of the waterkynd- the verdant bowl-shaped stretch of land that poured out from the sweeping, horseshoe-shaped cliff’s base until it reached the banks of the nearby Eyrie River.
This is why the man would jump and the Mythorian maiden with him, so they could be together. At the bottom of the drop, that would kill any normal human, a door of hope waited for the young man who looked on the lattice work of glistening falls decorating the broad, horseshoe-shaped cliff face. But he was no ordinary human. No. He was the son of the Prophetess and the Hammer Bearer.
Touched by the Hammer of Power’s magic and filled with a prophetic gifting that was handed down to him from his grandfather, Laz, through his mother, Muriel, he was not subject to the limitations that bound most men. He was a wielder of magic that surpassed the abilities his brothers possessed. And like the Mythorian, he was not totally of this warl, for he was an inhabitant of the mystical realm that the wizards loved to visit. Because of this, the plunge was not a last drastic step of a desperate man who wanted to escape the fleshly coils and the sufferings that accompany them. This wasn’t a suicide attempt. Nor did he want to destroy the body so his spirit could be released. Transformation was the goal. Not death. To change was the point. A change that would enable the two lovers to become one in a way that was not possible in the Warl of Man.
“Lylah, it’s beautiful, isn’t it?” The man turned to the Mythorian and renewed his smile.
“All of Nyeg Warl is beautiful,” the waterkynd maiden replied as she laid a silvery hand on the man’s arm. "You know that Kaylan."
“Indeed it is.” Kaylan leaned in and kissed Lylah on her receptive lips before he added, “But this place is different, it’s full of limitless possibilities.”
“I already know what you think of Mythoria,” the waterkynd said with a voice that sounded like a gentle breeze blowing through falling rain. “You’re just stalling, you scared rabbit.”
“Lylah, I’m not scared and you know it.” Kaylan laughed as he took hold of the Mythorian’s hand. “It’s just… well, the fall's hard to get used to, and what follows is a bit disconcerting.”
“What,” Lylah’s silvery eyes widened to accompany the sarcasm she was about to dispense, “having your body reshaped like it was clay in a zealous sculptor's hands bothers you?”
“Certainly not!” The man met sarcasm with sarcasm. “Why would I be bothered by the idea of being remade into something entirely different?”
“You’re so silly,” Lylah chimed in as the silvery moonlight washed over her. “Why would you want to be transformed in the first place? You’re not a Mythorian."
“Now look who's being silly.” The man reached up and touched Lylah’s long, mist-like hair as he spoke. “If it wasn’t for you, I’d not risk the transformation.”
“And if it wasn’t you, Kaylan, the change would be impossible to make, and jumping off this cliff would be a monumental mistake.”
Birthed by magic they never forsook, the waterkynd lived in a habitation with many rooms. Mythoria, situated in the Warl of Man, was only one of four of these.
Each room contained a realm that aligned with the different forms water could take: the Realm of Ice, the Realm of Liquid, and the Realm of Vapor. These three formed the foundation Mythoria was built on, for the Warl of Man was the only place where the waterkynd could assume any of their varied states of being; whereas, in the other realms, only one form could be attained. And it was to these other realms that Kaylan and Lylah planned to go to.
There, during the journey that the plunge off the cliff would initiate, the two would be changed into the same form and would become one kind. Little of Kaylan’s physical origins would remain. Truly, he would be reconstituted into something different, something no other human could become. He would become a waterkynd.
How was this possible?
His love for Lylah fueled him with a passion that infused his will with the strength needed to subdue the Warl’s Magic, compelling it to transform him as it did all the Mythorians as they moved through the various realms.
If it wasn’t that his body consisted of mostly water, even this would have been impossible.
But what of the rest of his substance, the part that fills the burial urns when the deceased are cremated? Well, isn't salt disolved in water? And powders too?
Vlad’War’s Magic that touched Kaylan while he was still in his mother’s womb made this unprecedented transformation possible. It was he spoon that stirred the cup.
Running his hand through his shoulder-length hair once again, Kaylan said, “For you, My Love... I’d jump over the moon.” Then he took a deep breath and bent his knees to lower his center of gravity.
Lylah mirrored his movements, and in a blink of an eye the two pushed off and were airborne. But instead of soaring to the moon, Kaylan and Lylah fell like stones toward a pool of water sitting two-thirds the way down the cliff side.
Speeding alongside a sheer wall of stone, soon split by a cut that deepened as the cliff side angled outward to make room for the numerous terraces and pools it held, the two entered a channel. Half way to their target, water spilled out of the pools flanking Kaylan and Lylah’s descent and accompanied them on their journey. And when the two struck the surface of the pool they were racing toward, the water joined them in a crushing explosion.
Slamming into the turbulent water’s surface, nearly being knocked unconscious by the imp
act, Kaylan felt Lylah’s hand slip out of his as the Mythorian melded with the water. His transformation wasn’t as smooth.
Tossed about like a hapless swimmer caught in a raging surf that was too great for him to master, Kaylan was jerked this way and that way by the unrelenting water that tore at his flesh like it was shucking an ear of corn. Kaylan endured the pain of being dismantled as he was shredded into increasingly smaller pieces that were soon dissolved in the liquid like spices thrown into a pot of boiling water.
When Kaylan was sure he couldn't bear the pain a moment longer, it ended. Then to his surprise, he was carried up out of the basin of water, whose surface had become suddenly placid, and floated over the pool to the nearby ground. There, he stood disoriented by his experience.
Kaylan looked like himself in most ways, He had the same general body shape and his facial features were proportionally the same as they were before the jump. He was dissimilar to his former self in that he looked stretched out like a roll of dough that has been lengthened before it's put into an oven for baking. Kaylan was a third taller, while only slightly broader. Added to this, his appearnce was less distinct like he was being viewed by someone with poor vision. This gave him a softer look.
Matching Kaylan’s elongated appearance, every plant and animal within view was tall and elegantly slender: the trunks of the largest trees were no wider than a normal man’s body; the stems of flowers looked fragile, thin, and too long; what appeared to be a herd of long-legged gazelle was actually a herd of wild oxen-like beasts. Pastel hues were everywhere. Only the undersides of the troupe of green clouds, floating through the pale pink sky like an armada of billowing ships, possessed a dark shade.
Below the clouds, shafts of pale blue rain fell to the hungry ground. And where the showers went, the trees and grasses reached up higher than seemed possible as they hungrily absorbed the nourishing bath. The oxen stretched out their long necks and bellowed joyfully as they joined in the watery feast. Seeing the look of wonder in Kaylan’s eyes, Lylah said with a voice that sounded more human than it did in Nyeg Warl, “Here the clouds rule.” The Mythorian’s voice was filled with rich feminine tones. “And the Realm of Vapor is sustained by the bounty they provide. Come and see.”
With that said, Lylah took Kaylan’s hand and ran off to meet the rain.
Laughing along with the lovely Mythorian maiden who led him onward, Kaylan relished her touch that was now, in this place, more substantial than in the warl where they first met. Here Lylah was more like the women he had known while growing up, more like his grandmother, Elamor, and his mother, Muriel. Clothed in a lavender-colored tunic, with skin the same color as his own, Lylah looked as Kaylan wished for her to look. The magic he possessed made this so. It painted her in hues that were familiar to him. That’s why her hair was honey-colored like his. Still, her eyes remained steadfastly blue as they always were when she was in the Warl of Man, blue as corn flowers.
This is what it must be like to be an elf, Kaylan considered the idea as he felt how lightly his feet touched the ground as he ran, as lightly as a woman’s hand patting down the hair a playful breeze had mussed up. Though he could feel his weight and Lylah’s hand felt as solid as any he had ever touched, the physical laws governing the Realm of Vapor seemed different: the pull the ground exerted on his body was less; the demands that movement made on his heart and lungs were diminished; he felt freer, less restricted, like he really could jump over the moon if he had a mind to.
Looking at Lylah, he laughed over the joy he had in the magic that inundated the Mythorians and the different realms they could navigate through. Then he laughed louder as he and Lylah passed through a curtain of falling rain and entered the heart of the downpour that lay beyond. The sensation that accompanied the welcomed shower was overwhelming as his body soaked up the rain and grew in height and weight. A head taller now, his shoulders were broader, along with his torso and legs. He felt like he did back in Nyeg Warl where his heart needed to pump harder and his lungs needed to pull on the air it inhaled. Lylah's hand felt firmer, almost human now. And when he looked into the beautiful waterkynd's eyes, he saw the same desire there that was welling up in him. It was a desire to touch much more than her hand: to feel her lips against his own; to pull her shapely body close; to release the joy he was feeling; to share its abundance with her, and to receive the gift she longed to give him.
Smiling in the way that women do when they know something their man doesn’t, her eye’s taking on a violet aspect as she did, Lylah tightened her hold on Kaylan’s hand and led him to a patch of fern bushes that looked like water lilies floating above stems as thin as a child's little finger. Here, on a bed of moss as red as the flames sewn into a Candle-Maker’s hood, beneath a canopy made of overlapping leaves, the human and waterkynd partook of the sweetness each had to offer the other. With the ferns' round, green leaves turning gold wherever the larger rain drops struck them, looking like drum skins being hit by luminous mallets, and the moss beneath them becoming a deeper shade of red, as the moisture-laden air that accompanied the rain drifted over the dense growth, the two became one.
As if it had a mind of its own, the green rain cloud overshadowing the lovers ceased its journey across the pale pink sky and stood still until desire was fully sated and the gentle joy that follows fulfillment took its place. Then, and only then, did the cloud move on and join the others of its kind as they drifted along, feeding the Realm of Vapor as they did. Though oxen ate grass and the waterkynd harvested the abundant fruit that grew on impossibly tall trees, rain was the true bread of life here.
The round leaves swayed to the rhythm of a gentle breeze that seemed intent on grooming the leafy canopy that sheltered the lovers who lay below. Intertwined in a comfortable embrace, smiles came easily to the couple as they spoke to one another. With their passion momentarily subdued, Kaylan and Lylah talked freely as those who truly enjoy each other’s company do, while they casually explored the expanse of each other’s skin and were warmed by each other's breath as it caressed their faces.
“I love you,” Kaylan said to Lylah as he brushed a wayward lock of hair off her forehead. And he did love her, as a man loves a woman. But his reasons for what he said went far beyond this. He loved Lylah for the mystery that surrounded her, for being all the things that the women he had known in his life weren’t, and for the possibility of adventure her presence promised. She was an undiscovered warl, a foreign place that lay beyond the far horizon, exotic and full of wonderful treasures. Most of all Lylah was the fulfillment of the yearning that had been with Kaylan for all of his life, a yearning for something more than what the Warl of Man had to offer.
But in the final analysis, Kaylan loved Lylah because he felt right when he was with her. It was like he had finally come home. Though he loved his family and didn’t despise mankind like some who ridiculed him postulated, he had never felt completely comfortable in the company of humans. He had always felt like an outside. That’s why he spent so much time with the elves of Mystlkynd and with the griffin living in Stromane. But even they were too attached to a warl he found to limiting.
Though the Mythorian race as a whole intrigued Kaylan, it wasn’t until he met Lylah that he became enthralled with the enigmatic waterkynd. Over time, he found himself visiting Mythoria more often than he could give logical reasons for. And each time he visited, he noticed the waterkynd maiden who stood on the periphery of the gatherings he attended.
He often wondered who this lovely, vaporous creature was, though he never took time to meet her. Still, the memory of the enchanting maiden was stored away in his mind as a recollection of something wonderful for reasons he couldn’t fully explain. Over time, he found the promise of the demure waterkynd’s presence a distraction that caused him to turn his attention away from those who were speaking to him to scan his surroundings in hopes of catching a glimpse of her. When he turned his attention back to those he was with, he saw that they were quietly waiting for him to complete
a search they were used to seeing him undertake. Knowing smiles were fixed on patient faces; maybe a raised vaporous eyebrow or two was mixed in as the Mythorian’s considered him and the fascination he had with the waterkynd maiden. Afterward, as if nothing unusual had happened once they saw Kaylan's attention had returned, they'd take up where they left off and complete their conversation.
Then one star-filled night, while Kaylan sat on the banks of the Eyrie River with the vast horseshoe-shaped cliff rising up behind him and the sound of water in motion, coming from both the river and the falls, providing a soothing atmosphere for his time of reverie, the waterkynd maiden emerged from the river where she had been swimming.
Not knowing she was there, Kaylan was startled out of his ruminations as the surface of the river rose up and took on a female shape.
Seeing that she had surprised Kaylan, Lylah spoke as she strode over the river's surface as easily as a human walks on a cobblestone-covered road. “Forgive me for my intrusion, Kaylan. That’s your name, isn’t it?” Her voice sounded like a breeze blowing through gently falling rain. “I’ve been watching you for some time now, and curiosity has gotten the best of me. Do you mind if I ask what you were thinking just now?”
After getting over his initial surprise, Kaylan’s astonishment over the waterkynd’s unexpected appearance was replaced with a feeling of self- consciousness that left him at a loss for words. Anxiously blinking his eyes as he struggled to gather his thoughts, all Kaylan could think of saying was, “Who are you?”