Drown Her
Late Joseon Period, 1894
Jukdo-gil, Ulleung-gun, Gyeongsangbuk-do
And in the last moments of her awaiting demise, Nabi wept.
The Goddess' tears now one with the crashing waves along the coast of Jukdo Island - an island she had once called home. An island where man stood over the cliff that sound Death to salvage her vessel.
And that is how man drowned a deity.
A deity she was, the bastard child of the Widow Village. Made from sin, and yet, the Heavens had blessed the impious lovemaking with a saint as a daughter.
No villager dared mock nor disgraced the illegitimate offspring, for she was empyrean- she was a Goddess.
But man is evil.
Man is wicked.
So when the moment came to deny the Goddess of her freedom, man collared the chance and chained their deity to the bottom of the raging Black Sea.
For three long days, a wild and rabid storm had savaged the coast. The guardians of the Widow Village advised everyone to remain indoors and avoid treading near the waters at any cost. For three long days, only the wailing of the grey sky and the sight of flickering red lanterns bided company to the people of Jukdo Island.
On the first day, a small merchant vessel that had tried to outrun the storm was demolished to splinters when it met with the teeth of towering rocks half a mile offshore. Fortuitously, the remaining sailors were brought to aid by a few passerby widows as soon as they floated to the seaboard.
Men were forbidden to enter the Widow Village. Barring, that was the condition set by the governing body of Ulleung-gun before the raging storm swept the whole county.
So for those three long days, the widows opened their doors to the men of the shipwreck. They opened their doors to the possibility of love for their young saint.
"How long have you been Captain?"
"As long as I can remember," replied the young man, a simper hiding in the corners of his lips. "Have you been to sea before, Nabi?"
The ethereal beauty shook her head in response to the Captain's query, brown eyes lingering at the man's stare before she set aside the meal she was feeding him. "But I do love it - the sea. I watch it day and night - during the brink of dawn and especially during the veiling of darkness. I hear that the night sky guides the ships back home," Nabi included with a dainty smile.
The Captain positioned himself to sit upright before flashing a grin to the young gal, amused by her statement. "That is true, but to be accurate, it is the stars that guide us back.
For instance, if I were to be back out at sea - The Herder[¹] would lead me back to you."
Nabi felt her cheeks flush with warmth and adoration. Could it be possible to love someone in only a matter of days? Because it was evident that the man before her - the young Captain of a wrecked vessel, the man with coal-black orbs that hid a depth of pearls behind his irises, the man with ash-brown locks that shimmer under the light of the moon - was in love with her.
And she, with him.
The storm was different on that third night. The gnawing of the waves to shore was quieter. The winds no longer howled with vexation but whispered tenderly. It was warm, safe - it was serene. On that third night, Nabi learnt the touch of a man, the devotion of man.
"Come with me," the young lass murmured, gazing into the eyes of his Goddess.
"Where would we go?"
"We will sail the seas. Go anywhere the stars take us." Nabi watched how his coal eyes sparkled with excitement - he reminded her of the ocean itself - calm and enveloping, exciting and full of spirit.
He was the sea.
And Nabi loved the sea. "Okay," she agreed with a smile.
But it never came to that, for when the deity awoke from her slumber, her eternal sweetheart was gone.
The widows informed Nabi that the sailors had left before dawn, rushing back to the ocean without a bid of farewell. The village priest, the only man allowed within the Widow Village, weaved a tale of deceit to Nabi. A story of how men deceive the kind, the beautiful, and that her lover, her Captain - was only one of those men.
"What are you doing?"
"I am leaving," Nabi responded calmly, hands burying her belongings into a brown sack.
"You cannot do that, my dear. You are our protection from the wrath of the Gods - you are our saint," replied the priest, his hand tightly grasping the young woman's wrist.
It was ludicrous - the belief that the villagers possess. Of how Nabi was no mortal because man could not be so kind, man could not be so untainted - so divine. They believed her to be a deity, their deity. And she was to remain on their island forever because they saved her. They did not slaughter her upon birth despite her bastard footing. To them, she was of debt.
"I am my person. I am human. And I owe the village nothing."
Her words could not have provoked the people more, for the last thing Nabi saw was a wrathful holy man and the grimace on the faces of the village widows, all before her sight darkened.
Two of the most well-known stars in Korea are Jikneyo (The Weaver) and GyeonWoo (The Herder), which are also known as Vega and Altair. They can be observed mostly during summer and fall.
Nabi is without a doubt, merely an average human being. However, the people of Jukdo are obsessed with religious ideologies that they've enforced such a belief onto a spurious offspring of a fellow deceased widow,