When I came to on the boat all I could think of was that the hammock I was in was actually comfortable. I had slept in a hammock Before but it was an awkward thing and prickly like laying on rocks. The door opened and a man walked in. He looked like a man out of the history books to be honest and if the water had not been green I would have assumed I fell into the past, rather than another world. He tried to speak to me in three different languages I had never heard spoken (and that's a feat I loved other languages and music in them) before he spoke English,
"What is your name?" his voice sounded similar to the way wine tasted. Smooth in texture but bitter sour in flavor.
"Candance Rivers." She answered him and watched as he frowned,
"Double named? Not good, not for here fallen Goddess." Oop, her brain went as she processed what he called her before chucking apprehension to the waves and apologizing to the abyss of her mind for any divinities that existed to hear because she was totally running with this.
"Oh? and what would be good for here?" She asked, trying to get out of the hammock without stumbling and making a fool of herself...she failed, of course and the sailor tried to hide his amusement.
"Candance or Rivers, just one." He told her, she frowned and thought on it.
"Rivers than." Her last name meant a lot to her only because it was her last tie to her brother and mother. She would miss them, expecially her brother, the weirdo was probably pissed that She fell into another world without him.
"Rivers. You speak the tongue of the ancients. All born in this world learn common so I shall teach it to you."
Looking back she should have realized from those two sentences that the sailor wasn't a sailor but she blames her slowness on the fact that everything was just so much More in that world. So much more.
She had followed him out onto the deck and just stared at everything, it took her by surprise again since she didn't actually "see" while she was falling. She stared at the world and then glanced.at the man who seemed amused.
"What's your name?" she asked him, it was only fair for him to tell her, considering.
"Barren." I thought that it was a weird name, and then returned my attention to the colors. I had always been a fan of colors and in this world they presented themselves in such interesting ways. I was impressed when the pink creatures, because they were creatures not fish or animals, flew out of the ocean and back in while barely making splashed. Barren watched my wonderment in amusement and taught me what he could on the long voyage back to his home.
I never really thought about it back then, how we got through the waters with such ease. I never looked up at the flag he flew. There were a lot of things that looking back at, makes me cringe and mentally slap my forehead. I was lucky, so very lucky to survive this long. I was even luckier to meet Lucky, but that's far ahead of the beginning."
When my powers began to show themselves Barren told me what he could and drew me a map to someone to teach me what he couldn't. I had to learn control before I capsized the boat we were on, and to do so, I learned to manipulate the winds for the sails, and how to alleviate the push of the waves allowing for swifter movement. While I slept the lanterns burned ever on in the tune of my breaths, and the metals around me crumbled and reformed to my dreams, it was a lucky thing that the ship was mostly wood.
Barren never told me but I knew, I had more magic than normal, he started to call me Goddess all the time even after I told him he didn't have to, mainly because I did not like to lie. He shook off my words which angered me, if he thought me a Goddess why would he dismiss me and my words? I never asked, figuring that if he crossed a line then I will react, until then I breathed deeply and counted. Other than lessons about the world we didn't talk much, and even the lessons yielded little in the ways of information, finally he asked,
"Oh, Great Goddess, why do you know so little?" I snorted,
"Did you think this the only world in existence? I am from another, Earth, here in Water everything is different but not terribly so."
"How did you get here?"
"The portal you saw." He frowned and shook his head and told her about their divinities. She learned them well, she wondered if they were like the ones in her old world or if these actually showed themselves. She didn't have to wait long, that very night she was on the deck while Barren slept. The red light in the sky that worked as their moon, surprisingly it was called Kuu, shifted and an image of a man appeared and followed the rays of red light down to beside her.
"You need not fear to take the name of Goddess. We find it hilarious." Kuu spoke and she stared at him for a few before her brain caught up.
"You exist!" she remembers exclaiming and Kuu was luckily one with humor for he laughed.
"I cannot speak for your world," he winked, she decided to back burner that one, "but every God and Goddess of this world exists." He paused and looked down to the sea. "My brother Sea, my and Solar's lover Airyn, Sea's lover Terra, Airyn's sister. We all exist and more."
"Oh." He laughed and touched her hair, warmth and cold spun down it,
"Survive young one, you might just get Lucky."
I never told Barren that Kuu talked to me, it didn't feel right. The Gods and Goddesses of Water both did and did not get involved. They had limits since there were laws set by the original creator of this world. The Creator was just that, Creator, they did nothing else but create worlds and leaving them in others cares. It was a good system to be honest.
Water was vast and held more lands than Earth did, and no technology, there was no need for it, except bending lightning would make charging things easy. She thought about these things a lot, more than she probably should, she had a feeling though, a feeling that she would return to Earth.
Barren did try to flirt with her after a while. She giggled and told him that although he was attractive she did not like men. He took it in stride and stopped flirting with her, another major difference from Earth, they were free with their love. Look to Kuu, Solar, and Airyn all three present themselves to mortals as male. It was a breath of good oxygen to know that. Something about herself she did not need to hide anymore, the freedom made her feel weightless.
When they reached land she gasped in delight The grass was a beautiful sapphire blue, the leaves looked like it was earth's fall despite it being summer here. The bark of the trees were all a deep red, it mirrored the sky in the early hours of the morning and the later hours of the night before the deep purple from the blue sun, Solar, took over. Back then she didn't think she'd be awed by the colors for long, because she wasn't awes by Earth's anymore but she completely underestimated Technologies hand in that apathy towards daily colors. In a world where your mind grows bored and has nothing of technology to grasp on to, colors become a endless fascination. Back then, though, she took in everything, committing as much information as she could to her memory.
She learned that she was expecially glad that she didn't fear bugs. The bugs in Water were the sizes of cats and dogs. Spiders, she learned, were the size of common house cats and were called Octo-Walkers. Flies did not exist nor did mosquitoes, not in this area at least. Bees were Flower-Bringers, or some random other language word vaguely sounding like KLpOf sounded out. Centipedes were bad. Monsters of this world the size of dolphins from earth. they were called the One-Hundred-Legged-Death. I decided to write them down as Ohld or centipedes for when I forget my own acronym. Ohld were not easily beaten their exoskeletons were beyond tough. They were immune to fire, water and earth, but Airyn giggled around me and whispered in how to defeat it. I felt for the air withing the thing, as it geared to spit burning acid at us and then I grabbed and pulled. The air expanded and blew the creature up, Barren lifted an earthen shield to guard us against the gore. After that the distance he kept from me was a tad much. He was wary and careful with what he said and how he treated me. It was saddening since I thought, at that point, that we were friends. Our goodbyes were soured by that distance as I took off alone to follow that map. He had given me a sack to carry food and some gold and silver. Now thinking back to it, I should have questioned the fact that Barren had gold and silver and no coppers, but I blame my ignorance on the fact that it was a new world, and that Barren told me next to nothing about currency. So off I went on my own, with two of the highest forms of currency and enough food to feed a small household for a week, and not at all nervous for I didn't know that the roads and forests held more dangers than mixed animals and overgrown bugs.