1. Eirik and the Secret of Avalon
The cold of the night had seeped into Eirik’s very bones,
but colder still was the desolation in his chest. That darkness, which had
snatched away not only his breath but also his memory, imposed upon him an
unyielding design: to find his beloved.
'How could I find my way,' I wondered with a pang of
bitterness, 'if the old paths of the mind have been erased like engravings
in the sand? What strange force has woven such chains upon my will, allowing
only the echo of a love, but not the path to find it?'
Even so, the promise made to his heart resonated louder
than any obstacle. With his ship, faithful companion of a thousand tides, and
the wisdom of the winds and stars, Eirik vowed to traverse the vast domains of
Midgard, and far beyond if necessary. He would seek the hidden bay, that
blessed corner where the celestial lady waited.
Guided by the only resource that still remained intact
within my head—my intuition—, I steered my course, as was my custom, following
the sun's path towards the horizon and the position of the evening stars, until
I reached that immense cloud in the middle of the sea that always stood in the
way of my journey home.
After a lapse that felt like an eternity, I finally descried
the figure of a distant island shrouded in the mist. Suddenly, a flock of
gannets tore through the silence, soaring over the haze with a rhythmic beating
of wings that I knew well.
I felt a surge in my chest, a sudden warmth that defied the
freezing air of the deck. My arms, still numb from the salt spray, gripped the
helm with renewed strength while a smile, almost forgotten, curved my lips. My
pulse quickened; their white silhouettes cut against the grey were the
definitive sign I was waiting for. 'At last, I have reached the harbour of
my dreams,' I thought, while observing their circular flight over the
invisible cliffs. My
heart beat with a jubilant urgency, as if each pulsation wanted to push the
boat faster towards that embrace of stone and penumbral light.
In that fleeting instant, the beating of wings released a
shower of white feathers that descended upon the swell like pale snow. I seemed
to discern those specks of light lingering on the surface, caressed by fingers
of foam emerging from the depths to hold them in a strange, almost deliberate
pattern. I felt a pang of certainty; a hunch that this white trail was no mere
caprice of the wind, but the echo of a presence already awaiting me on the
other side of the veil.
The island seemed to float between the folds of time,
rocked by the oscillating foam of the sea. That mass of stone, now wrapped in a
translucent gauze, was lost in the distance as if entering into nothingness.
Scents of intense ripe apple broke through the veils of vapour, like invisible
gusts flooding everything around in an incessant swaying. Avalon appeared in
the midst of that shapeless cloud, showing glimpses of emerald green that
filtered through channels opened in the mist as if the stone itself breathed
through the light.
Access to the mythical Crystal Isle, protected by perpetual fogs, was not easy to find. 'Only he may conquer it' —in the words of the Nine Fairies—'who feels a deep conviction and brings with him a noble purpose.' And so Eirik achieved it, driven by the certainty that he would find his beloved there, for the memory of her breath, sweet as apple pulp, continued to spiral amidst his thoughts.
Now with his feet firm upon the shore, he then passed
through a bright, diaphanous entrance. He walked resolutely over the silver
sand, hoping to see once more the graceful figure of his beloved wrapped in a
cloak of magic, just as always happened under the spell of the final rays of
sun before the night of the equinox.
But on the other side, as the last traces of watery breath
dissipated in the air, he found only the solitude of the void and the bitter
taste of nothingness. In it, the echoes of his own thoughts were lost, blurred
by the muffled howls of wolves in the distance. And yet, in a single instant,
the image of the place began to appear before his eyes in all its splendour,
with a sky veiled in golden tones by the sunbeams behind clouds of translucent
crystal glass.
After his long conscious reverie, during which he seemed to
hear his beloved’s voice whispering his name, there appeared before him the
presence of a lady of solemn bearing. She looked him fixedly in the eyes,
halting time, and prepared to release him definitively from his lethargy.
Eirik searched her features with a painful urgency. The
woman before him possessed a serene, almost mineral beauty; her skin had the sheen
of alabaster and her eyes, deep as mountain lakes, distilled an ancient wisdom
that would intimidate the boldest warrior. She held her head high upon a neck
of graceful and powerful curve, like that of a swan, and she moved with a
cadence so fluid she seemed not to touch the ground, as if her feet scarcely
brushed the dew. Yet, this was not the woman of his life. A sudden cold ran
down his spine as he understood the truth: that face was not the one that
inhabited his dreams, nor did her presence cast the warmth his heart craved.
'Welcome art thou to the Isle
of Avalon,' the High Priestess spoke to him, as she held out her hand
for him to kiss. 'Thy steadfastness of heart and thy noble
purpose have given thee direct access to our world, hidden and inaccessible to
others.'
Eirik’s gaze was lost for a moment in the misty horizon.
There, amidst the apple trees of golden glow, he thought he saw female figures
gathering fruit. Their movements were those of the waves kissing the sand, and
their voices, a distant murmur, the song of the sea that cradled the island.
Instinctively, I sought the contact of the metal on my
lobe, the small anchor that kept me tied to my world and the memory of my
beloved. As I brushed the bare skin, a gelid void struck my chest. The earring
was gone. In that instant, a suffocating anguish stripped me of all strength; I
felt that, by losing that object, I had also lost the hope of seeing her again.
I felt like a castaway on an eternal shore, a wandering spectre who had broken
the only thread linking him to his destiny.
With a frank gaze and a voice that conveyed a deep and
reassuring peace, the Priestess read Eirik’s thoughts with clairvoyance and
prepared to warn him of what would transpire from that moment onwards:
'I regret to tell thee that thou
art very far from the place thou desirest to find. It seems that fate holds a
long and exhausting odyssey in store for thee. My soul senses that Avalon is
but the first threshold of many thou shalt have to cross.'
And in that instant, the High Priestess placed in his hands
a sacred pentacle, a marvel of alchemy, composed of five apple seeds. Each one
shone with the light of immaculate gold, a jewel that for its brilliance and
purity would have been worthy of the neck of the goddess Idunn herself.
'With them thou shalt grow an
apple tree that will only germinate in that land where thy beloved truly
dwells,' the
Priestess’s voice sounded this time as if it came from behind the stone walls
in the distance. 'Only then, when at least one of the seeds
germinates instantaneously, wilt thou know that thou art in the exact spot thou
so longest to find.'
Eirik closed his hand over the pentacle, feeling the warmth
of the alchemical gold against his skin and his deep sorrow. He bowed his head
slightly in a sign of respect before looking at her again.
'I thank thee for this gift, Lady of the Mist,' he said with a firm voice. 'Tell me, whither must I depart? How
shall I find my path in the immensity of the abyss?'
However, the answer did not come with words, but through a
ritual of divination that seemed to drain the very light from the air. After a
surrender of exhausting intensity, the High Priestess glimpsed a fragmented
truth: the trace of a captive island, a kingdom hidden behind veils of
perennial mist and the incessant roar of the tides. It was there, in the
heartbeat of an ocean that never rests, where her clairvoyant eyes found the
reflection of a lost object. She revealed to him that a three-pointed talisman
awaited in the depths of that abyss, buried by the oblivion of the ages,
waiting for an unshakable will like his to claim it from the silence.
'Thou must depart for a land
that is hidden beneath the weight of the waters,' she revealed in a measured voice. 'Only
in the heart of Atlantis shalt thou find the Silver Triquetra, that talisman
which must serve as thy compass and thy shield. With it, thou mayest navigate
the paths of the universe in perfect harmony among the strength of the body,
the clarity of the mind, and the purity of the spirit. It shall remain with thee
until thou findest the end of the road.'
An unexpected warmth began to make its way into my chest. It was a
brief throb, a spark of hope that defied the logic of the abyss; I understood
that, although my hands were empty of memories, they now carried a promise.
That incipient light did not erase my sorrow, but it granted me the strength
necessary to raise my gaze and accept the fate that opened before me.
'The only thing that remains
for thee to do,' she instructed, with a voice that carried the faint echo of
a warning, 'is to gird the talisman to thy chest, and instantly it
will become thy guide, thy faithful companion in this long pilgrimage…' she murmured, her gaze now absent, as
if the next veil were being drawn back before her eyes. 'Atlantis,
the sunken city, awaits thee…'
Eirik stored the golden seeds in a pocket of his tunic,
feeling their weight like a constant ember against his skin. With a final
gesture of respect, he took his leave of the High Priestess. She began to move
away with the same composure with which a swan glides over a mirror of dark
water, vanishing amidst the scents of the apples and the vapour of the
fountains until her figure was but a memory of whiteness in the mist.
Upon reaching the boundary where the earth melted into the sea, Eirik found his wooden vessel amid the foam that seemed to await his arrival. He turned one last time: in the distance, the song of the nine maidens dissolved into the whisper of the wind like a beating of white wings crossing the firmament. A strange and inexplicable familiarity raised the hairs on his arms; in the cadence of those voices beat the distant echo of a slumberous melody, a whisper that belonged not to that island, but to shared nights in another time and in another place, reminding him that, even while departing towards the uncertain, he did not travel entirely alone.
- I. OVERTURE: My Name is Eirik
- II. EXORDIUM: "MYTHOS", Symphony of a Wandering Soul
- III. RESONANCE: My Story and the Secret of the Shadows
- IV. PRELUDE: Eirik's Dirth
- CHAPTER 1: Eirik and the Secret of Avalon
- CHAPTER 2: Discovery in Atlantis
- CHAPTER 3: In the Shadows of Hades
- CHAPTER 4: The Pull of Niflheim
- CHAPTER 5: The Icy Breath of Yule
- CHAPTER 6: Return to Mabon
- CHAPTER 7: Eirik and the Mystery of the Sirens
- CHAPTER 8: The Mirror of the Lake of Shadows
- CHAPTER 9: Finale
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