Isle of Gods I: Damek

by H. Lovelyn Bettison

  “But where are you?” I asked.

  “The Island,” the voice said.

  “What island?” I asked all the while knowing somewhere deep inside exactly which island she spoke of.

  “Come to the island now. The door will open soon and you will be able to pass through it. Pass through it, Damek,” she said. “Come get me.” She looked to the side quickly. Her eyes widened with panic. Her image faded, leaving me looking at my own reflection in the mirror.

  “Don’t go,” I said. I put my palm on the smooth glass. “I don’t understand.” It was too late. She was gone and I didn’t know when I’d see her again, but I knew I needed to leave for the island soon.

  Chapter 6

  Many of the boats had taken a pounding, slammed against the docks again and again by the fierce wind the night before. Mimi had survived the night unscathed. Raul was standing on her deck looking out at the horizon when I walked up behind him. “I love the morning after a storm,” I said.

  He nodded and took a puff of his cigar. He blew out the sweet-smelling smoke in one long exhale. “I hope you’re ready to get to work?” he said.

  “You know me. I’m always ready.”

  Raul put me to work painting, which was funny because of all the things wrong with this boat the paint job should’ve been the least of his worries. When I mentioned that he said, “If it looks good they’ll pay more for it. Let ’em figure out the rest of the stuff on their own.”

  I heard that Raul used to be a real stand up guy, but once his wife died everything went downhill. He didn’t much care about anything except revenge and we all knew who he wanted revenge on. That’s what our trips were all about, but can you really get revenge on the gods? That was a lost cause, but the fruitlessness of it was what kept him going all these years. That was until now. I didn’t know what he was going to do once he got rid of this old boat. Mimi was everything to him. It was the cord that tied him to his wife, to the gods, to revenge, to becoming more than himself. It was his lifeline. Now he was getting rid of it. What would happen next? What would he become?

  Here I was painting and the whole while the sea lapping against the shore seemed to be saying my name. I wished I had the money to buy this thing myself, but I could barely pay my rent. If I couldn’t buy it, I’d have to convince Raul to keep it and go out on one last voyage with me.

  I got sandwiches from the deli a couple blocks away and we ate lunch on the boat looking at our handy work, a sloppy gray and red paint job. “You’ll need to dry dock this thing to really clean it up.” I was stating the obvious.

  Raul took a bite of his sandwich. “I already told you. We fix what they can see.” His mouth was full making his words a jumbled mess. He swallowed without fully chewing. “If it’s under the water they can’t see it.”

  “Seems like you’re trying to sabotage this sale before you even have a buyer.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I took a sip of my drink. “By doing the bare bones you make less people interested. Look at the stuff you painted. It’s sloppy.”

  “Screw you. My paint job is fine.”

  I laughed. “Right. I don’t think you really want to get rid of this old boat at all.”

  Raul scrunched up his face with annoyance. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I don’t? You’ve had this boat for how many years now?”

  “A few.”

  “A few. At least as long as I’ve known you.” Raul wasn’t the first person I started sailing with. We met at The Tornado. He was a regular there too. I was sailing with Martin Jordan at the time. He was a rough old fisherman and I’d been helping out on his boat since I was in high school. I wasn’t really interested in fishing though. What I was really interested in was exploring. I’d been coming up with my plan to find the Isle of Gods for years when I sat next to Raul at the bar one day and he told me about his plan to capture a god. As soon as he told me I knew that I needed to work with him. I changed boats that day and we started our hunt together. If I’d been seeing was right, we’d be able to realize the dream we’d both had for years. “Sailing is part of who you are. Do you really think you’ll be able to give that up?”

  He shrugged. “Looks like it.”

  “What if we plan one more run before you sell this old thing?”

  Raul laughed. “Didn’t you just tell me you weren’t sailing anymore until you got your woman back.”

  I was feeling a pull in my chest. The ocean was calling me. The woman’s voice wouldn’t leave me alone. “I’ve been thinking that if I find the Isle of Gods, maybe she’ll take me back.” I thought for a moment wondering whether I should tell him about the woman I kept seeing. “Have you ever seen something that you just can’t explain?”

  “All the time. That’s why I drink so much.” Raul took the last bite of his sandwich. “What did you see?”

  I looked out over the clear sapphire water. “Call me crazy, but I think we’ll be able to find the island this time.”

  Raul laughed. “You think so. What would make this time different than any other time? What’s to stop us from sailing around in circles before going home empty handed this time too? People have been trying and failing for lifetimes.”

  “Reznik found it. We can find it too.” I looked up at the sky and it was as if I could see the image of the woman from my visions painted in the clouds. “I know why we haven’t found it. It’s all about the time you go. There is a door that opens up only at certain times and if you’re in the right place at the right time you can just sail right in.”

  “What about the machine Reznik invented to help him find the island?” Raul asked.

  “That contraption had nothing to do with it. That’s why no one else who copied his machine has been able to get there. It wasn’t his machine that got him there. It was when he went. He was just lucky, lucky enough to be there at the right time to sail straight through the door.”

  “How do you know all of this all of a sudden?” He narrowed his eyes at me. This wasn’t the first time I’d thought I could get us to the island.

  “I think I might’ve had a vision.”

  Raul snorted and a bit of food flew from his mouth. “Might’ve had a vision? What are you some kind of prophet now?”

  I shook my head. “No, I’m just a sailor.”

  “What did you see in this vision of yours?”

  I closed my eyes for a moment gathering the details of the first time I saw the woman in my mind. “I keep seeing a woman. She wants me to help her and she says she’s on the Isle of Gods.”

  “What’s she look like?” Raul was skeptical and I didn’t blame him. No one had visions anymore. That had stopped almost thirty years ago. The last person who did was a woman from so far north that her eyes were as light as clear sea glass. She saw a vision of a man telling her that we were nearing a new age.

  “She had long dark hair and sharp chiseled features. She was beautiful, maybe the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

  Raul chuckled. “And you still want to get back together with your wife?”

  I nodded.

  “How do you know she is a god?”

  “I don’t.” The idea that she was a god hadn’t really even entered my mind before telling Raul just then. “I only know that she says she’s on the island and that if we want to get there we must leave soon, while the door is open.”

  “Next time you have one of your visions you tell the gods that Raul Costillo is coming for them.”

  “You can tell them yourself when we get to the island, but we’ll have to leave soon if we want to get there.”

  Raul shook his head. “I’m not ready to go out again. Fighting with the gods is impossible. There is too much heartache in it and I’ve already suffered enough.” He sighed. “I’m a mortal. Who am I to think that I have control over anything in my life? Who am I to think that I can take over my destiny? We all have to accept what is given to us. That’s our lot as mortals.�
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  “Since when were you the type to accept anything? What if we find it this time? What if we go down in history? Imagine how great it would be if we were the ones to find the gods and end this plague that has attacked our newborns. We could save our species.”

  Raul scoffed. “I don’t care about saving anyone. I want one of them because I want to show them what it’s like to lose someone you love. I want to show them suffering.”

  “Don’t they already know that?” I asked, thinking of the stories I’d read about Eilim’s tears. The very oceans that we sail were a result of a god’s grief.

  “They don’t know it enough.”

  I had nothing to say to that so I sat finishing up my sandwich. Raul was the type that acted as if he were they only one who had ever suffered. If you talked to him he’d have you believe that no one else could possibly have ever felt the heartache and grief that he felt when his wife died. He’d have you think that only his suffering mattered. That was never true.

  Raul stood up and started wandering around the boat. I watched him, his thick body hunched. The stubble on his face was mostly gray now and I started to wonder if he wanted to get rid of the boat because he was just too old to sail anymore. “Just one more trip?” he said.

  Balling up my trash, I said, “I know it will work this time. Do you still have that old electromagnetic machine you made?”

  “Of course I do. It still works too.” Raul had always been more prepared than me for one of our trips to be successful. He’d made a powerful electromagnetic force field generator before I’d even started sailing with him to make sure any god he caught couldn’t escape. It mimicked a more powerful version of the planet’s own magnetic field. According to the Book of Gods this was the only way to limit a god’s ability to use her power. If she was surrounded by this concentrated magnetic field she would be powerless like mortals.

  “Good.” He hadn’t given a concrete “yes” to going yet, but I knew he would.

  “Let’s finish up the work around here and I’ll think about it.”

  I nodded knowing that he didn’t really need to think about it. He was already in. The idea of making the gods pay was real to him. He was never going to give up on it. He could fool himself, but he’d never fool me.

  When Lourdes opened the door her face dropped. “Were you expecting someone else?” I asked.

  “It just seems like you’re here more now than you were when we were still together.” She shifted Tati from one hip to the other.

  I reached out and took her from Lourdes. “Hi, baby,” I said.

  Her eyes were so bright with life. “Datty,” she said, holding her arms open wide.

  “Can I come in for a minute?” I asked.

  Lourdes looked around nervously.

  “Is someone else here that you don’t want me to see?”

  “No,” she said. “You’re here so much that I haven’t really had any time to process what’s going on with us.”

  “You always said that you wanted me to be here more. I’m trying to do what you want,” I said.

  “That was before we were separated. Right now we are suppose to have time apart, but you’re not giving that to me.”

  Sometimes I had such a hard time figuring out what she wanted from me. I felt like if I really did stay away she wouldn’t be happy with that either. “I just need to talk. It will be fast”

  “Okay, but only for a few minutes.”

  As soon as I sat on the couch Tati wanted down. She slid onto the floor and started looking through an animal picture book on the coffee table.

  Lourdes looked at me with questioning eyes. I was so glad to get time with her without her mother, but now I wasn’t quite sure where to start. “I’ve been having visions,” I said.

  She narrowed her eyes at me. “Come again.”

  “It started the night I came to pick up Tati and it just keeps happening.”

  “That woman you said you saw on the wall?”

  I nodded.

  “You think she is a god?”

  “What else could she be?”

  “How can you be sure? Maybe you’re just crazy.” She crossed her arms across her chest.

  “I’m not crazy.” I spoke as if I were certain, but in reality I wasn’t. I could’ve been crazy. This could’ve all been a figment of my imagination, but if it was what would that mean? I didn’t want to entertain the thought.

  “No one has visions anymore. That stopped before the babies started being born sick.” She looked down at Tati.

  “I know.” The time when the gods spoke to us had passed. Many had given up the possibility that they might ever hear directly from the gods again.

  She looked off into the distance for a few moments. “Why would they choose you? After all this time, why you? You’re a liar and a cheater who has no respect for destiny. You hunt them.”

  “I know.” I held back my urge to defend myself.

  She shook her head. Then she stood and walked across the room to the closet and opened the door. There she had a new altar set up that I’d never seen before. She bowed to it and raised her Sacred Circle pendant to her forehead and then her mouth.

  “Lourdes,” I said, staying on my spot on the couch. “I’m not finished yet.”

  She spun around to face me. She drew a circle on her chest with her index finger before speaking again. “Of course you aren’t done yet. If you really are a visionary you must come forward to share the message of the gods with the world. What did she tell you?”

  “That’s the other thing. She wants me to help her leave the island.”

  “What? How can you do that?”

  “I have to go back out to sea. I have to find her and bring her back here.”

  “For what?” she asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “But you’ve seen the news. Another ship vanished just last week.”

  “I know,” I said. “But with the protection of a god we’re bound to be safe.”

  “I want Tati to have a father.”

  “So do I.” I stood up and walked toward her. “I’ll come back. This is my destiny. I’ve known it ever since I was a kid. I have to go.”

  “But you don’t believe in destinies,” she said.

  “I do now and this is mine. It’s my duty to follow it.”

  She nodded and a tear slid down her face. “But there are no guarantees.”

  “There are never guarantees. I didn’t think it would matter this much to you anyway.”

  “It still matters,” she said.

  I approached her slowly, sliding my arms around her. I waited for her to pull away, but she didn’t.

  “It’s just that I thought you weren’t going out to sea anymore.”

  “I didn’t think I was going either, but I have to.” I pulled her into me taking in her familiar smell of peppermint and lavender. “I’ll be back. I always come back.” Her hot tears soaked through my shirt.

  “You can’t make any promises.”

  “I can’t, but this time I have a god on my side.”

  I spent the night in my own home, in my own bed, with my wife, for the first time in months. That was enough to make me reconsider going on this trip at all, but I knew it was something I had to do.

  Chapter 7

  It didn't take long for Raul to get a crew together. Most of the old guys were available. Finding full-time work in town was hard so when he announced that he was setting sail again even some new guys wanted a chance on his boat. He took on one extra guy, saying that we might need some more help this time around. The new guy was a skinny fellow named Marco with a port-wine stain birthmark below his left eye. I’d seen him around a few times, but didn’t know him.

  “Do you really think taking on new crew is a good idea?” I asked the day before we set sail. I’d met Raul on the boat to take care of a few last minute details before we left.

  He looked up at me over his wire-framed rectangular reading glasses. “If we really do ca
tch a god there is no telling what will happen on board. I think it might come in handy to have an extra man.” He twisted the final keeper stone into place. Raul had bought eight of these stones on the black market when he first started looking for the Isle of Gods. They weren’t very big. Each was only the size of a loaf of bread, but they were all he could afford. He sold everything he owned to buy them. They were sought after by people like us who were hunting the gods because they could stop the gods from being all-powerful once they entered the mortal world. There were only two islands on the entire planet where we could find this rare jet black rock. One of those islands was a lifeless place far out in the ocean. Only a few people had ever been there and those few had stripped it of all of its keeper stones. The other island was the Isle of Gods.

  Raul had made eight pillars that surrounded the cell that he would keep the god in and a keeper stone was attached to the top of each of the pillars.

  “But how well do you know Marco?” I asked.

  “Well enough. We can trust him. He looks slimy, but looks can be deceiving. He’s a good sailor and I promised him that if I ever went out again he could come along. I’m a man of my word.” He pushed his glasses back on his nose.

  There was no use arguing with Raul. I was the one with the visions, but he was the one with the boat. The crew was his call.

  He patted the smooth side of one of the keeper stones. “I sure hope these things really work,” he said.

  “I do too.” I laughed nervously. The whole idea of the keeper stones was based on legends and rumors. There were a few vaguely worded lines in the Book of Gods that people used to support the idea, but it had never been tested. How could it be? Reznik never confirmed or denied that it actually worked. Even if he had ever addressed the issue there was no way of knowing whether or not what he said was accurate. He didn’t seem lucid much of the time.

  I felt slightly nauseous as I left the boat and my head throbbed behind the eyes. I’d been so busy patching things up with Lourdes and getting ready for this voyage that I’d been ignoring the most important element of this whole venture, the mysterious woman. It had been awhile since I’d seen the woman in my visions. She wasn’t gone completely though. Sometimes I thought I could sense her looking on, but she hadn’t communicated with me directly since Raul agreed to sail again. I was hoping she’d turn up. Sometimes I looked in the mirror or flipped on a TV looking for her.